Three Republicans have already declared their intentions to seek office: Councilor Chris Medlock, Mayor Bill LaFortune, and former Republican Party Vice Chairman and District 11 State Senate nominee Brigitte Harper. Councilor Bill Christiansen is widely expected to run, as long as his Benjamin'n'Burdge stablemates on the Council (Randy Sullivan and Bill Martinson) can fend off an audit comparing the actual records of fuel purchased and sold at his Jones Riverside Airport business to the fuel flow fees paid to the airport authority.
Despite the widespread disappointment in Bill LaFortune's performance as mayor -- less than 40% support for reelection in his own party according to the latest SoonerPoll.com survey -- no Tulsa Democrat has seized the opportunity to challenge a vulnerable incumbent. That says a lot about the weakness of the Democrat bench in Tulsa. It may also indicate that the Democrats who would have a shot at winning are too dependent on the same oligarchy that seems content with keeping LaFortune in place.
The name of Don McCorkell, former state rep, has been floated as a great Democrat hope. McCorkell is an attorney, but if the online court records are accurate, he doesn't seem to have practiced in about 15 years.
What has McCorkell been up to? In 1996, he finished second to humorist Jim Boren in the Democrat primary to face Jim Inhofe's first Senate reelection bid. In 1997, he was a lobbyist for CFS. He was an early investor and member of the Board of Directors of Great Plains Airlines, buying 10,000 common shares for $10 in December 1998, another 95,000 shares for $95 in October 1999, and 790,478 shares for $790 in May 2000, for a total of 915,478 common shares, about a sixth of the total. On July 1, 2000, he became one of the first four preferred shareholders in Great Plains, purchasing 11,676 preferred shares for $35,028, coincidentally the same number of shares and the same date as Steven Berlin and Great Plains Chairman David A. Johnson. (Steve Turnbo was the fourth of the first four. Berlin and Johnson also each bought 790,478 common shares in May 2000.) He is listed as a 1999-2000 registered lobbyist for the Tulsa Industrial Authority, which is mixed up in the mortgaging of Air Force Plant No. 3 for Great Plains financing. The listing indicated he terminated his lobbyist registration in that period.
Because of his service on the Great Plains Airlines Board of Directors, he and fellow board members have been personally sued by William Stricker, from whom Great Plains bought Ozark Air and its aircraft in March 2001.
It's been rumored that McCorkell is one of those who received in payments for services rendered to Great Plains more than he invested in Great Plains, but we'll have to wait until the records are released until we can know for sure.
Lately he seems to have been interested in multi-level marketing, which seems to be a good fit for anyone involved in the Great Plains deals. Anyone able to convince an entire state legislature to part with $30 million for a risky airline venture can probably talk people into being MLM downlines. He was or is president of something called Casafina International LLC, which was launched in October 2003. Here's the plan for CasaFina associates, and here's his letter to prospective vendors. Here's a bit of pre-launch hype.
Rodger Randle won his 1988 race for Mayor by holding meet-the-candidate coffees in living rooms all over town. If McCorkell runs, will he be the first candidate to use in-home "business opportunity presentations" as a campaign technique?
At least one group of Democrats seems despondent over the lack of someone credible to carry the Democrat banner next spring.
Comments (4)
I have a better idea. How about a moderate to fiscally conservative person run as an INDEPENDANT. It is obvious the two majority parties are defunct. Medlock should have done this.
Posted by Joseph Wallis | October 25, 2005 8:15 AM
Posted on October 25, 2005 08:15
Great reporting Michael! Great Plains Airlines records does go way back to 1996/1997 where we can all see a DEMOCRAT mayor of Tulsa and a DEMOCRAT convincing our Oklahoma state legislature in a scheme! Yes a scheme where even the Bank of Oklahoma that has policies on risks involved in making bank loans BOK even turned them down twice! BOK should share some of the blame and tell exactly what made them sign off in loan committee meetings for agreeing to the Great Plains deal -- that would not be good news for confidence who do business with BOK.
Our of curiosity, did CONVICTED democrat State Senator Stipe
buy any shares in Great Plains Airlines or have any democrat connections with anyone involved in the Great Plains Airlines disaster! If Stipe doesn't come up with the money on his pledge due soon, the Stipe name can be seen in the State Capitol -- does anyone have a problem with that? When you realize Stipe makes a mockery out of what he stood for as a State Senator considering why he was convicted in Oklahoma. Realize, investors like the Tulsa World (Lorton's are registered Democrats?) that had a sizeable investment in Great Plains along with all the other investors, all records should be revealed. I would like to see that published in the Tulsa World (and I don't mean 3% -- let's see exactly how many shares were purchased by who and any other questionable problems involved. Those are the people that should be paying the TAB for the Great Plains loan. Just like Stipe trying to deceive others with what he was convicted on, the democrats and investors in the Great Plains Airlines involved deceived the Oklahoma State Legislature and used their Great Plains project as a gamble. If a bank turns down the loan twice, that shows evidence, this deal was a gamble from the start.
Posted by susan | October 25, 2005 8:33 AM
Posted on October 25, 2005 08:33
Great reporting Michael! Great Plains Airlines
records does go way back to 1996/1997 where we can all see a DEMOCRAT mayor of Tulsa and a DEMOCRAT convincing our Oklahoma state legislature in a scheme! Yes a scheme where even the Bank of Oklahoma that has policies on risks involved in making bank loans BOK even turned them down twice! BOK should share some of the blame and tell exactly what made them sign off in loan committee meetings for agreeing to the Great Plains deal -- that would not be good news for confidence who do business with BOK.
Out of curiosity, did CONVICTED democrat State Senator Stipe
buy any shares in Great Plains Airlines or have any democrat connections with anyone involved in the Great Plains Airlines disaster! If Stipe doesn't come up with the money on his pledge due soon, the Stipe name can be seen in the State Capitol -- does anyone have a problem with that? When you realize Stipe makes a mockery out of what he stood for as a State Senator considering why he was convicted in Oklahoma. Realize, investors like the Tulsa World (Lorton's are registered Democrats?) that had a sizeable investment in Great Plains along with all the other investors, all records should be revealed. I would like to see that published in the Tulsa World (and I don't mean 3% -- let's see exactly how many shares were purchased by who
and any other questionable problems involved. Those are the people that should be paying the TAB for the Great Plains loan. Just like Stipe trying to deceive others with what he was convicted on, the democrats and investors in the Great Plains Airlines involved deceived the Oklahoma State Legislature and used their Great Plains project as a gamble. If a bank turns down the loan twice, that shows evidence, this deal was a gamble from the start. Please list ALL of the Great Plains Airlines investors and do a story in the Urban Tulsa Weekly on this.
Now we see reported by Ken Neal a
St. Louis planner thinks downtowns in other areas of the U.S. should "CAPITALIZE" on a
"trend" ( they haven't seen our ghost town downtown have they and who actually is roaming the streets at night in our downtown) Tulsa should do the same. Instead of building an out of place looking ARENA at a HIGH PRICE to taxpayers who are already overly taxed why don't they focus on getting all those businesses that left back to Tulsa which will employ people that lost their jobs from the companies leaving and/or find new companies that will replace all the office space
that is VACANT!!!!!!DOWNTOWN.
Posted by susan | October 25, 2005 8:45 AM
Posted on October 25, 2005 08:45
why would they? they already have the best candidate money can buy in LaFortune
Posted by mad okie
|
October 25, 2005 2:09 PM
Posted on October 25, 2005 14:09