By Rep. Jim Grego
Budget talks between the governor and House and Senate Leadership seem to occupy most of the news coming out of the Capitol this week as the clock begins to run out as far as coming to agreement on our budget. Some of the contention seems to be whether Oklahoma can afford a cut in personal income taxes or not.
I’m of the belief that yes we can afford another quarter-percent cut. The Senate president pro tem continues to say he won’t let his chamber take a vote on the issue. With that conversation taking up much of the time, budget chairs haven’t been able to complete work on the other areas of the state budget. One thing they did agree on is appropriating $45 million for recovery efforts from recent storms throughout the state.
E-Mails have been numerous as some groups have sent out alerts about rule changes the Department of Education has proposed. Many are copying and pasting generic e-mails, and often I think they don’t fully understand the changes. The House Administrative Rules Committee has studied each rule proposed by the Education Department, and will present their recommendations on approving some of the rules and disproving others on the floor sometime this week or next. This is a work in progress, and we don’t know what the final product will look like. But this bipartisan group has done much detailed work and will answer many questions on what they bring to a vote.
Finally, the world of journalism lost a good one this week with the passing of James Beaty of the McAlester News-Capital. In the political world you are never sure who you can trust or not in the media. At first I was somewhat skeptical of James, but as the years went by we tended to communicate more, and I came to where I could trust telling James anything. He would always report it honestly, even on subjects we didn’t agree on. James always finished an interview with the question, “Is there anything else you want to add?” I always wondered how much people would volunteer because of this question. I would always use it for my excuse to exit the interview. James, I’m going to miss you.
As always, thank You for allowing me to serve you. I can be reached at (405) 557-7381 or by email at jim.grego@okhouse.gov.
- Jim Grego serves District 17 in the Oklahoma House of Representatives. His district includes Latimer County and part and Pittsburg County.