Revenue failures, people suing the government, and look, the state is reopening!

A whole lot has happened over the last week! From declarations of revenue failures at the state and city level, to civic groups suing the election board, to legislative candidates who don't actually live in Oklahoma, to - wait for it - the state is slowly beginning to reopen. But is that a good idea? We discuss it all!

• Governor Stitt announced that SQ802, Medicaid Expansion, will be on the ballot on June 30th.
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• Quick recap:
• On Monday, April 6th, Governor Stitt cancelled the Board of Equalization meeting because his ‘digital transformation’ project was not funded. So, he only signed 2 of the 3 bills the legislature passed to help shore up this year’s budget, but without that third bill, there was still a $416M hole in the budget. Basically, they state was funded through the end of April, but we didn’t have enough money for May and June. The legislature scoffed.
• So, a week later, on Tuesday, April 13th, House & Senate leaders sued the Governor to force the Board of Equalization to meet, because they have to declare a revenue failure in order for OMES to be allowed to access the state’s Rainy Day Fund. The Governor scoffed.
• This week, the Governor unceremoniously called a meeting of the Board of Equalization, who meet via Zoom and declared a revenue failure for current fiscal year (FY2020). While most everyone agrees that next fiscal year (FY21, which begins on July 1st) will also have a revenue failure, we have to wait until we get there before the Board of Equalization can make that determination. (But that didn’t stop the Governor from announcing his proposal for budget cuts for both FY21 and FY22.
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• Meanwhile, the price of oil went negative. Congresswoman Kendra Horn suggests the US invest $3 billion to add additional oil to the strategic oil reserve.
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• Oklahoma City basically declared a revenue failure and announced across-the-board departmental budget cuts ranging from 3-11%. Cities are funded by sales tax revenue and, well, the world is closed.
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• Governor signed gaming compacts with two tribes and it includes sports betting, but the legislature and the Attorney General aren’t on board. But...why is that, really?
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• Challenges to candidacy were heard and they were...pretty bizarre.
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• On Thursday, the Oklahoma League of Women Voters and two individuals filed legal action against the Election Board to try and force changes to absentee voting to make voting by mail safer and easier, while still maintaining the integrity and security of our elections. 
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• And, of course, in COVID-related news, OU has made a new, faster test and the Governor announced his plan to reopen the state...but not everyone is on board with that plan. About an hour ago, Mayor Holt said he plans to lift the ‘shelter in place’ order on May 1st, but with social distancing and other sanitary guidelines. If data changes before May 1st or afterwards, he will not hesitate to put it back in place. More testing sites are opening; you can go to https://doineedacovid19test.com/ to find out.

• As we look towards next week, Governor’s emergency powers ends (CHEPA) on April 30th. The legislature will have to reconvene to decide whether to grant the Governor another 30 days of powers should the Governor request them.