9 hours ago
Oklahoma lawmakers didn't think we deserved to know their plans as session ended, and they did a lot
Representatives Josh West, R-Grove, left, Steve Bashore, R-Miami, and John Pfeiffer, R-Orlando, watch the vote returns on a veto override vote during the House session on May 29. (Photo by Janelle Stecklein/Oklahoma Voice)
Oklahoma's lawmakers are supposed to be accountable to the people who elected them, but our legislators conveniently forgot that last month in their frenetic scramble to reach the finish line.
Lawmakers spent the final night of the annual legislative session chugging cups of coffee and scarfing down pizza as they cast dozens upon dozens of consequential votes while most of their constituents slept.
When Oklahomans awoke the morning of May 30, they suddenly found themselves with nearly four dozen new laws ramrodded through the Legislature in the dead of night. Meanwhile, the head of a state agency woke up unemployed after legislators suddenly decided to fire her just before the stroke of midnight.
It's not necessarily problematic that lawmakers cast votes at night: That happens many years because they procrastinate or are otherwise disorganized. What was extremely concerning this time was that they entered — and exited — the penultimate day without a full public agenda posted.
If their sparse public agenda was to be believed, the state House of Representatives and Senate had no plans to take up any veto overrides or even the state's mental health commissioner.
The reality was starkly different.
It turns out our elected officials, who we pay to operate in the public, strode into session, secretly planning to override Gov. Kevin Sittt's vetoes on a wide range of topics ranging from mammogram screenings to food truck fire safety to investigations of missing and murdered Indigenous women.
But they apparently didn't think the public was entitled to know those plans. It wasn't until they actually started voting that the public got an inkling that something was afoot.
How is that good governing? Do our lawmakers think they know so much better than their constituents that they don't believe the people they represent should be able to weigh in on significant issues? Or is it just that they think the only voices that matter are the lobbyists gathered around the chamber television screens watching the shenanigans play out in real time?
Is it any wonder that Stitt posted a video on social media frustrated with all the last-minute maneuvering and telling voters to watch closely?
Because make no mistake, these were consequential votes. A successful override of the governor's veto meant these measures became law.
And there were some great veto overrides like increasing women's access to mammogram screenings and focusing resources to help tackle the state's Missing Murdered and Indigenous People crisis.
But there were some headscratchers. One such veto override saw lawmakers waste nearly five hours deadlocked on a strange bill that changed the leadership requirements to become the Oklahoma National Guard's top leader. Stitt said later it creates a new pension system, will cost taxpayers' a lot of money and that lawmakers didn't know what they were voting on. I'm still not 100% certain what exactly the bill does, but critics of the measure grumbled under their breath that the changes would benefit a seated lawmaker, and that the House leaders wouldn't allow any more critical veto overrides — like mammogram screenings — to move forward until that one happened.
The Legislature decided Allie Friesen, the mental health commissioner, needed to go with all the chaos surrounding her agency's budgetary disarray, cut and canceled contracts and the need for tens of millions of dollars just to make payroll. Lawmakers were so disillusioned with her leadership in the final days that they essentially stripped her of her power to directly implement a landmark mental health settlement that involves providing competency restoration services for indigent defendants.
Stitt, who opposed the firing, said Friesen disturbed 'the status quo and questioned long held practices at the agency.' He also criticized Sen. Paul Rosino, R-Oklahoma City, and Rep. Josh West, R-Grove, who ran the measure, questioning what they stand to gain, what they were trying to keep covered up, if they have conflicts of interest, and if Rosino was 'trying to help his wife avoid responsibility for her role in the finance department there.'
Rosino admitted during questioning on the Senate floor that his wife works as a part-time employee at the agency. She was apparently working there even while her husband was helping lead investigatory hearings into the agency's operations and sought Friesen's firing. Stitt later apologized for bringing Rosino's wife into the conversation.
We've entrusted our lawmakers with an enormous amount of power.
They're pretty much the only governmental entity in the entire state that is not subject to the Open Meeting and Open Records Act. They have internal rules that govern their behavior, but it's not uncommon to watch them waive those at a moment's notice when they deem it convenient.
That means legislators basically do whatever they want, when they want and how they want. The public can't look at their correspondence to determine what's happening behind the scenes that could influence their decision-making. Even the Governor's Office has to comply with both laws.
Given lawmakers' secretive behavior, I think it begs the question, do they continue to deserve this level of trust? Lawmakers, how would you answer this question?
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