GO Bonds, GO

I've said this on the radio, but I don't know if I've posted it here yet. I'm supporting the City of Tulsa General Obligation Bond Issues that are on the ballot this coming Tuesday. I've even got "YES" signs in my front yard. You can find details of the projects that the bond will pay for here.

Yes, I know it means city property taxes will go up, but they've been going down the last few years, and they won't return to their previous peak. The extra cost is about $30 a year on a $100,000 home. The City of Tulsa has a backlog of $4 billion in capital improvements needs -- sewer and water line replacement and extension, arterial street widening, residential street rebuilding, along with improvements and replacements for city-owned buildings. Through the third-penny sales tax and these GO bond issues, we're just keeping pace as the needs continue to pile on. We're still building out the infrastructure for land the city annexed in 1966, and at the same time, we've got to replace infrastructure in the older parts of the city. We really should have voted on this a year and a half ago, but it was delayed to make way for Vision 2025. While I would have preferred many of the Vision projects to go to the back of the funding line behind more critical infrastructure needs, that didn't happen, and the infrastructure needs are still there.

There has been some talk about defeating the GO bond to send a message to City Hall. If that happened, it would send the wrong message. The Cockroach Caucus would argue that the failure of the GO bond was the fault of Mautino and Medlock and their allies, and the defeat would be used as ammunition in the campaign for their recall as well as in next year's election. There's been scuttlebutt that at least one branch of the Cockroach Caucus would like to see the bond defeated to damage Bill LaFortune and soften him for defeat by their handpicked replacement. The time to send a message to City Hall is on May 10, when the replacement for District 5 City Councilor Sam Roop is elected -- we need to make sure we get someone in that district who wlil keep the Reform Alliance in the majority.

(In the interest of full disclosure, it turns out that my street will be rebuilt if one of the GO bond questions passes, but I'd already decided to support the bond issue before I knew that, and I'm voting for the items that have nothing to do with me.)