Two ‘no-brainers’ for fixing Oklahoma’s budget crisis
The theme of the Oklahoma Policy Institute’s third annual State Budget Summit could have been the exhortation by the institute’s outreach and advocacy specialist, Kara Joy McKee, who urged the audience, “Feel the fear, but do it anyway.”
The institute pulled no punches in documenting Oklahoma’s “full-fledged budgetemergency.”
After adjusting for inflation, the state’s current budget is nearly $900 million, or more than 11 percent below 2009, when Oklahoma was mired in the Great Recession. A mid-year revenue failure has already been declared, forcing most agencies to make deeper cuts, and a second round of mid-year cuts may be coming. Legislators are expected to have $901 million less for next year, and the shortfall could be even greater.
In other words, as the institute’s Gene Perry explains, Oklahoma is a close cousin to Kansas, which dug itself into a financial catastrophe when making extreme tax cuts. Worse, two experts from the Kansas Center for Economic Growth, Annie McKay and Duanne Goosen, explained that the damage Kansas inflicted upon itself won’t be undone “for a generation.” The Oklahoma City audience was taken aback when it was told that Kansas has even addressed its shortfall by imposing enrollment fees for attending public Two 'no-brainers' for fixing Oklahoma's budget crisis - NonDoc: