The Legislature has adjourned for the summer. It was an up and down session, but let’s talk about the good things first.
It is always a pleasure to work with the high school students who spend a week at the state Capitol serving as a page. They have their own legislative session where they debate and vote on a couple of bills. They work hard while we are in session to help things run smoothly. Near the end of session Brooke Herbst and Kira Armstrong from Grove served as pages. Both of these ladies did a great job and are a credit to the young generation of our state.
The main job of the Legislature is to craft the state budget. Like all negotiated products, no one is ever completely happy with the final product. Due to our recovering economy we had more money (your tax dollars) to distribute this year. Every area of government, from education to roads and bridges, received more money this year than last. No area got as much money as they asked for with the exception of the Department of Mental Health. Like everyone, I wish we could have funded education more and given state employees a pay raise, but overall it was a decent budget and I voted in favor to adopt it.
Perhaps the most significant piece of legislation passed was a bill to reform our Worker’s Compensation Insurance system. Worker’s compensation is the insurance that businesses have to have to cover their employees in case they are injured on the job. Our system has some of the highest rates in the company. It is a system that creates an adversarial relationship between the injured worker and the company he works for. The new system (modeled to some extent after the one in Arkansas) uses an administrative system rather than a court system. Companies can use the savings they should begin to seen in their insurance rates in a couple of years to expand their business, give pay raises or hire more employees. I voted for the bill.
If there was a glaring failure in the legislative session it was in the area of health care. The popular program known as Insure Oklahoma, which uses cigarette tax dollars to assist small companies and their low-wage workers with health care insurance premiums, is going to expire at the end of this year. The program currently helps 30,000 Oklahomans get health insurance. When the program expires about 18,000 of these folks will be covered under the new Affordable Care Act (“ObamaCare”), but the other 12,000 will lose their insurance. I worked with Senator Brian Crain of Tulsa and designed an excellent plan to address this problem, but due to the politically charged nature of health care reform following the passage of the Affordable Care Act, the governor was not willing to support our plan at this time. As this issue comes to a head at the end of this year I suspect she will have to address the problem, like it or not. I am sure components of my plan will be a major part of any solution.
During session we also tried to reform the food stamp (SNAP) program. It is a federal program so there is not much we as a state can do to change the rules. We did put in the requirement that able-bodied adults had to be working or looking for work in order to use food stamps, which are paid for by Oklahomans’ taxes.
Overall, it was a session with little controversy, and few major accomplishments. I am glad to be back home and look forward to traveling the district (Delaware and Mayes Counties) and having the opportunity to visit with many of you. I appreciate that you allow me to serve as your voice in the Oklahoma House of Representatives. I can be reached atdougcox@okhouse.gov or405-557-7415.