Monday, May 24, 2021

Like exhausted parents at 11 a.m. the morning after hosting their kid's slumber party, watchers of the State Capitol have a simple message for the children of the Oklahoma Legiislature: Go home.

Of course, a couple of big questions are yet to be answered this week ahead of the constitutionally required adjournment no later than 5 p.m. Friday, May 28. If all goes smoothly, however, lawmakers could adjourn the year's regular session a day or two early.

As always, check the House and Senate floor agendas for daily updates on what bills might run when. As you will read below, a key one is already set for a Monday House hearing.

1 minute:
HB 2966 is the revised charter school bill

We told you last week about the efforts of Rep. Sheila Dills (R-Tulsa) to revive her proposal for reforming the oversight requirements of charter schools in Oklahoma.

After meeting with stakeholders and trimming down some of her original proposals — such as no longer trying to add a competitive bidding requirement for charters that hire education management organizations — Dills' adjusted effort dropped Friday as HB 2966, a vehicle of House Speaker Charles McCall (R-Atoka) because only leadership policy bills can be introduced at this point of session.

The bill is one of 27 measures listed on the House daily floor agenda for Monday. Most of those bills are conference committee reports, which means a great deal of the language could be new or significantly different than past versions of a proposal.

2 minutes:
Stitt still sitting on budget bills to sign, veto

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt still has some decisions to make about this year's state budget package, with 27 of the 40 budget-process bills still awaiting action on his desk.

Stitt signed 13 of the budget bills Friday, including HB 2960 and HB 2963 to reduce the corporate income tax rate from 6 percent to 4 percent. He also signed HB 2962 to cut the top individual income tax rate from 5 percent to 4.75 percent. He signed SB 1080 into law to expand the total tax credits afforded to programs under the Oklahoma Equal Opportunity Education Scholarship Act. The bill was opposed by some public school advocates.

Stiltt also signed: HB 2890, HB 2893, HB 2894, HB 2899, HB 2912, SB 1037, SB 1038, SB 1059 and SB 1077.

But a couple of the year's more controversial measures — involving the creation of a new Medicaid program for ambulance services and the designation of duties for the state administrative director of the courts — remain on Stitt's desk.

HB 2950 (creating the ambulance fee program to draw down additional federal Medicaid dollars) and HB 2913 (placing the Court of Criminal Appeals under the management of the administrative director of the courts — currently Jari Askins) each received strong opposition Thursday from Republican senators who argued that the measures are "policy bills" masquerading as budget measures that cannot be amended under the Legislature's JCAB rules.

"This is a policy bill that the policy chair could not explain to you because it did not go through a policy committee," Senate Health and Human Services Chairman Greg McCortney (R-Ada) said during debate on HB 2950. "I very much encourage you to vote no, not because it's a good policy, not because it's a bad policy, because we have no idea. (...) I believe this committee took up a bill it should not have taken up. I think we need to stop this practice."

McCortney offered a similar critique of HB 2913, which Senate Judiciary Chairwoman Julie Daniels (R-Bartlesville) said she had not known about. She asked questions of fellow Sen. Brent Howard (R-Altus) who presented the bill, but she and McCortney were not appeased by the awkward explanation.

"The more I have listened, the less I have understood what we are trying to do here," McCortney said of that bill.

Earlier Thursday, Senate Democratic Leader Kay Floyd (D-OKC) had railed against GOP leadership for the JCAB process having a lack of "transparency."

"We hear a lot about open and transparent government up at the Capitol," Floyd said. "Those can't just be talking words."

Hours later, however, Floyd and her fellow Senate Democrats voted in favor of both HB 2950 and HB 2913, narrowly sending those bills to Stitt despite more than half of the Senate GOP Caucus opposing the lack of transparency.

3 minutes:
Speaking of vetoes, will #okleg override any?

Sure, Gov. Kevin Stitt is much happier with this year's legislative session than he was last year, when he vetoed several major measures, including the state budget, and watched the Legislature respond by overriding his opinion and cramming many of them into law.

But the first-term governor in his third session has still uncapped his veto pen on occasion. So far this year, Stitt has vetoed seven House bills and four Senate bills.

None have been over-ridden yet, and it remains to be seen whether any will. Most prominently, pharmacists have been advocating for legislators to override Stitt's veto of SB 821, which would create the Patient's Right to Pharmacy Choice Act. The bill passed the Legislature with broad support (78-11 in the House and 40-3 in the Senate) but was opposed by CVS, the State Chamber of Oklahoma and others.

The process for overriding a veto must start in a bill's chamber of origin, and two-thirds of each chamber's membership (32 in the Senate and 67 in the House) must vote in favor of the override.

Aside from SB 821 (and whatever other bills Stitt might veto this week), here is a list of the bills the governor has vetoed this year:

• SB 222 modifying the definitions of school bullying;
• SB 419 regarding U.S. history assessment scoring in schools;
• SB 500 requiring published reports about local tax increment financing (TIF) districts;
• HB 1090 authorizing the state auditor and inspector to examine the books and accounts of all public officers, institutions and governmental entities;
• HB 1598 allowing a new agency to authorize vision screeners for public schools;
• HB 1849 exempting school district foundations from sales taxes;
• HB 2313 authorizing inspections of juvenile facilities;
• HB 2088 exempting the Legislature and court systems from certain fees and costs for services rendered by state agencies;
• HB 2090 expanding the membership and definitions of the Rural Broadband Expansion Council;
• HB 2500 changing the qualifications for the Oklahoma Abstractors Board.

5 minutes:
The future of hydrogen fuel in Oklahoma

Grand River Dam Authority CEO Dan Sullivan said during an April 29 meeting of a joint legislative task force on the state's largest public power utility that he has "signed several" nondisclosure agreements over the past six months with companies that are considering relocation or expansion within Pryor's MidAmerica Industrial Park, to which GRDA provides electricity.

"Who knows what any of those will do? But the one thing I can tell you for certain is that we are not counting on just one project," Sullivan said.

Among the projects that could involve GRDA is an effort led by Secretary of Energy Ken Wagner to drive commitments of $1 billion of investment to develop a hydrogen fuel industry in Oklahoma. Such an industry could yield investments in new power and processing plants, retrofitting existing gas power plants, pipeline expansion, fuel storage, trucking company opportunities and carbon sequestration.

"As of right now, it's my No. 1 priority," Wagner said. "This is the one technology that is complementary to all of our best resources. (...) I think the long-term impact is tremendous."

National and international energy leaders agree. In late 2020, a Forbes article touted green hydrogen as "the fuel of the future" and predicted a 50-fold increase in its production over the next six years.

So what is hydrogen fuel, and what could its development look like in Oklahoma?

Read more about the push for a hydrogen fuel industry in Oklahoma.

BONUS:
New chairman for OU Board of Regents
on Thursday and Friday

The University of Oklahoma Board of Regents is scheduled to meet at 2:30 p.m. Thursday, May 27, and 8 a.m. Friday, May 28, in the Robert M. Byrd Library on the OUHSC campus. The board's agenda will eventually be posted here. OU President Joe Harroz said recently at the State Capitol that he does not think the proposed resolution to the university's Cross Village issue will be formally considered this week.

"I don't think it's on the agenda," Harroz said May 11.

While a number of other items could appear on the agenda — including some sort of action regarding OU's ongoing dispute with Blue Cross Blue Shield — the meeting will be notable for two governance items. For starters, the meeting with be businessman Rick Nagel's first as an OU regent since Gov. Kevin Stitt selected him to succeed Chairman Gary Pierson. Stitt had originally appointed Pierson to fill a two-year unexpired term, which meant Pierson was up for reappointment to a full seven-year term.

"Gary served us well, but since he was out of state and has tremendous commitments, we decided to go with Rick Nagel, who kind of filled that same vein from a business standpoint — something that the board needed," Stitt told NonDoc on April 8. "But this guy lives in Norman, Oklahoma. So, I just felt like I needed folks who could be super, super engaged locally. I think Rick is going to do a great job, not taking anything away from Gary Pierson."

Since Pierson had served as chairman of the board for the past calendar year, regents are expected to select their new chairperson this week. Traditionally, the board's vice chairperson becomes the next chairperson. Former Gov. Frank Keating was Pierson's vice chairman, but he has multiple years remaining on his term. Regent Michael Cawley, on the other hand, is serving one more year of Renzi Stone's unexpired seven-year term. Stone left the board after regents voted for Pierson as chairman in October 2019. Cawley appears to have some support for becoming the OU Board of Regents' next chairman, but who knows what negotiations and discussions might take place in public or executive sessions.

DOUBLE BONUS:
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