Election dates set; fuel fee investigation thwarted
The Tulsa City Council voted tonight to set new election dates for the 2006 election season, in order to comply with new state laws designed to put enough space between primary and general elections to accommodate military absentee voters. The primary will be March 7th, general will be April 4th. These dates are closer together than the original dates, but by moving our dates to March and April, Tulsa qualifies for the same exemption that allowed Oklahoma City to keep their dates as is. Filing period will be Monday, January 9, through Wednesday, January 11.
(UPDATE: Fixed general election date, per comment from City Attorney Alan Jackere.)
Also tonight, the Council voted 4-3 to conduct fuel-flow audits to determine whether some aviation fuel vendors at Tulsa's airports have been underreporting sales to avoid paying the city all the fuel-flow fees they owe, in accordance with Section 203 of Title 1 of Tulsa Revised Ordinances. Henderson, Mautino, Medlock, and Turner voted yes, Martinson, Sullivan, and Neal voted no, Christiansen recused himself (his business sells aviation fuel at Jones Riverside Airport), and Baker was absent. Without a fifth vote, the motion failed. I have been hearing rumors about this for several years. If true, the city is being cheated out of fees that we are owed, and we have to wonder how the Tulsa Airport Authority managed not to notice for so long.
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Christiansen made sure he understood when the filing period was going to be...hmmmm
The airport authority probably didn't notice because they were raking in so much money to begin with. Jones airport is one of the busiest in the country. Not to defend their stupidity or anything. They need to get all the fees they can to pay off those legal bills that will soon be coming their way.
The general election was set for April 4.
Baker had to change the oil in his truck last night, I guess.
Pretty darn non-comittal of him. His conscience wouldn't let him vote against it, the GOB's wouldn't allow him to vote for it.
Thanks for the correction, Alan.
Why is it a 4-3 vote could call for a recall election (without a 'Resolution'), but a simple audit authorization (which is already provided for in the Ordinance) by a quorum could not?
Heck, if the City believes funds are missing, why is not the City Auditor on it anyway?
The Whirled yesterday made a big deal out of the Resolution being promoted for open discussion of the Airport investigation not being required due to it never having been voted upon to be closed discussion in the first place. Yet, it seems, even when something is spelled out explicitly, it gets contorted into what was never meant.
If something's wrong, check it out. Dare I say, just do your jobs. (City Auditor?)
At some point there is going to have to be some middle ground on some of these issues. Nothing will ever get done. If there is an audit process, and according to ordinance, it looks like there is, and there are questions with teh fuel flow fee collection, the city could do a random pre-audit to determine if indeed there could be an issue, and then on a cost/benefit basis, determine if there is a reason for a full audit. Again, there needs to be some negotiation on some of these things.
Cost benefit basis...crap. If someone's stealing, nail 'em.
Why are we short two auditors anyway?
Ken Neal opinion Saturday's news "Fix the charter" about at-large councilors giving balance.
He is quoted as saying "let's change the charter to fix this major problem"
The charter change is led by Chip McElroy and the charter change according to the T.W. is quoted as having the support of most of the Tulsa County business community. Wow! That's a lot of businesses -- do they actually have a list of all those businesses in Tulsa County showing support for the charter change? Can they post businesses in favor so we can see those on the Batesline site. At least 10,000 names have been collected in 90 days to require the Mayor to call an election. Are all those names actually businesses in Tulsa County?