Published March 26, 2021 at 6:00 AM CDT Listen • 23:59
This Week in Oklahoma Politics, KOSU s Michael Cross talks with Republican Political Consultant Neva Hill and sitting in for Ryan Kiesel is Democratic State Representative Forrest Bennett about the state of Oklahoma moving into phase four of its vaccination plan allowing all residents over the age of 16 to get inoculated against the coronavirus, Epic Virtual Charter School fails to repay the state $11.2M by a deadline set earlier this week and Attorney General Mike Hunter appointing a special counsel to investigate the Pardon and Parole Board.
The trio also discusses State Senator Shane Jett hiring his cousin as his legislative session before firing her once questioned by a reporter and a legislative deadline results in the stalling of more than 70% of bills at the State Capitol.
The fight over who owns former reservation land in Oklahoma is intensifying. Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter is asking a local tribe to stop sending letters to oil companies for past-due tax payments. The letter, sent to the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes in early April, comes after oil and gas operators reached out to Hunter’s office about the past-due notices they received from the tribes.The letters were notices involving “significant outstanding severance taxes with interest and penalties.”Hunter said the notices to the companies are “unclear as to the scope of the jurisdiction the tribes now assert.”The letters appear to have been widely sent to operators within Blaine and Canadian counties, Hunter explained.Hunter said a lack of clarity in the notices has blindsided operators and threatened the local economies. Hunter said in a statement that his office is asking the tribes to clarify their positions on the past-due notices.Today, tribal Gov. Reggie Wassana re
VOICE is seeking answers to several questions related to the storm, including:
• Who made a profit from the storm, and will the Oklahoma Attorney General conduct a grand jury investigation into that issue?
• What policies were in place that allowed this to happen, and who, if anyone, will be held accountable?
• How did utility companies fail to have hedging contracts in place that could have capped at least some of their fuel costs during the storm?
• Why won t shareholders of publicly traded utilities have to carry some of the financial responsibility for decisions made by those companies leaders?
“Oklahomans experienced 46 ‘extreme weather events’ between 2010 and 2020,” said Pam Bracken, a VOICE member representing Mosaic United Methodist Church. “What’s going to happen to utility costs after the next storm, and the one after that? Our policy can’t be, ‘Oh, shucks, fooled again, we’ll pay it this time, but just wait until next time.”