Tulsa Election 2025 Category

Tuesday, February 11, 2025, is the annual school primary for Oklahoma school districts and technology center districts, plus city elections in some charter cities, and a number of special county, municipal, and school elections. Polls will be open on election day from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Visit okvoterportal.okelections.gov to find your polling place and view your sample ballot. Early voting will be available on Thursday and Friday only from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. There will be no early voting on Saturday. Tulsa County early voting will be at the long-time election board building in the old Marina-style Safeway at 555 N. Denver. Only one early-voting location will be open for Wagoner County, at the First Baptist Church, 401 NE 2nd, Wagoner; unlike many recent elections, the Broken Arrow location will not be open.

Tuesday is a primary election for any school board seat with three or more candidates; if any candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, that candidate is elected; otherwise, the top two candidates compete in the school general election on April 1, 2025, alongside school board seats for which only two candidates filed. Also on February 11, some charter cities, including Oklahoma City, Norman, Edmond, Bristow, Pryor Creek, Ponca City, and Altus, will elect mayors or city councilors; in Tulsa County, only Owasso has a municipal election. Special primary elections will be held for unexpired county commission seats in Oklahoma and Okmulgee Counties. Many school districts, including Jenks and Owasso, will vote on bond issues (property tax increases). There are county-wide propositions in Garvin, Major, Sequoyah, and Wagoner Counties, most notably the Wagoner County proposition to increase the county sales tax for 15 years, in lieu of a 10-year increase in property taxes, to pay a $13 million dollar civil rights judgment. Here is the full, statewide list of elections for February 11, 2025.

Tulsa County elections:

Tulsa Public Schools, Office No. 3: Brandi Joseph. Incumbent Jennettie Marshall is not seeking re-election for this district, which covers nearly everything north of Pine Street, plus all of the Osage County portion of the Tulsa Public Schools district. Brandi Joseph (39) is the lone registered Republican running. Joseph is an ORU alumna and member of Victory Christian Center. Dorie Simmons (50) and Eartha (Shanina) McAlester (46) are registered Democrats; Kyra Carby (39) is registered independent. Simmons is a real estate agent and attends Metropolitan Baptist Church. Carby was a TPS teacher and a community engagement manager for the Gathering Place and Guthrie Green and is now "Community Genealogy Grant Coordinator for the City of Tulsa. In this role, she oversees the administration of the Emmett Till [Cold Case] Grant Program providing support to grant subrecipients while advocating for the victims and families of racial violence from the Tulsa Race Massacre." None of the candidates filed the required pre-election campaign and expenditures reports by the Monday, February 3, 2025, 5 p.m. deadline. Nehemiah Darnell Frank doesn't like Brandi Joseph, which is a very good endorsement in her favor.

Broken Arrow Public Schools, Office No. 5: Bruce Allen Lamont (48) is the lone Republican running. Jerry Denton (60) is the incumbent Democrat. Another challenger Kate Williams (40), a freelance writer and an adjunct professor at TU and TCC, is also a Democrat. Williams filed a Statement of Organization, but none of the candidates filed the required pre-election campaign and expenditures reports. In response to my open records request, the BAPS district clerk indicated that she was unaware that candidates were required to file anything other than a Statement of Organization. The Broken Arrow Sentinel interviewed Williams.

Owasso City Council, Ward 5: Chad Balthrop (R, 54) is Executive Pastor at First Baptist Church, Owasso; Brandon Shreffler (R, 43) is a driving instructor. Long-time incumbent Doug Bonebrake is not seeking re-election. Neither candidate has anything on the web or social media that describes specific policies or what they would change about Owasso's direction as a city.

Jenks Public Schools bond issues: Proposition No. 1 is $18,950,000 for Phase III Freshman Academy expansion, plus other improvements; Proposition No. 2 is $650,000 for student transportation equipment. According to the Jenks Bond Transparency Act document, Jenks Schools has $114 million in outstanding debt principal, plus $33 million in unissued bonds approved at the 2020 bond issue election.

Owasso Public Schools bond issues: Proposition No. 1 is $193 million for a new 5th grade center, fine arts center, soccer complex, and other improvements; Proposition No. 2 is $4.5 million for vehicles for student transportation. According to the Owasso Bond Transparency Act document, Owasso Schools has $56 million in outstanding debt principal, plus $33 million in unissued bonds approved at the 2022 bond issue election.

Beyond Tulsa County:

• Wagoner County sales tax increase, 0.25% for 15 years, to pay federal court settlement
• Garvin County sales tax increase, 1% for 15 years to build a new county jail
• Major County sales tax increase, 11/32-cent (0.34375%) for 18 years to build a new County Health and Education Center and renovate the existing Health Department building
• Major County sales tax increase, 3/32-cent (0.09375%) for 7 years for county courthouse renovations
• Sequoyah County 4% permanent lodging tax for fairgrounds operation (60%), contracting for marketing and tourism promotion (30%), and roadside beautification (10%)

UPDATED 2025/01/27 with information about Wagoner County precinct meetings. See the end of this entry for details.

This coming Tuesday, January 28, 2025, at 6:00 pm, Republicans will gather for precinct meetings across Tulsa County, the first stage in a series of conventions leading to the Oklahoma Republican State Convention in May.

Precinct meetings were traditionally held in homes, but in recent years the Tulsa County Republican Party has arranged for central meeting places where multiple precincts can gather. These are organized by State House district and located at churches, community centers, and libraries. The complete list of meeting places is at the end of this article (click the "Continue reading" link if you're on the main page).

Here's how the meetings typically go: After the Pledge of Allegiance and invocation for all the precincts present at the location, voters separate by precinct, then each precinct caucuses to decide who will serve as precinct chairman, vice chairman, and secretary for the next two years, decide who will go as the precinct's delegates to the county convention (usually everyone present), and then debate and discuss any resolutions for platform planks or amendments to the party rules. All of the above gets recorded on various forms. Often, only one voter shows up for a particular precinct, and things go very quickly. Nearly all precincts choose to send an "open" delegation to the county convention, which means that the number of delegates attending is not limited by the number of votes allocated to the precinct; the votes of those who attend are weighted proportionally to the votes allocated.

On Saturday, March 1, 2025, the Tulsa County Republican Convention will meet at the Stoney Creek Convention Center in Broken Arrow and elect a new chairman and vice chairman, the county's two representatives on the State Committee, and the county's two representatives on the 1st Congressional District Committee. These six individuals together form the county's Central Committee. Incumbent chairman Ronda Vuillemont Smith is not running for re-election. The county convention will also vote on a county platform and any proposed rule changes. The county convention will almost certainly vote to attend the state convention as an open delegation, allowing any of the county convention delegates to serve as state convention delegates, where a state party chairman and vice chairman will be elected to a two-year term. The Oklahoma Republican State Convention will be on Saturday, May 3, 2025.

It's best to be present at your precinct meeting if you wish to serve as a delegate to the county and state conventions, but there is another path if you cannot attend on precinct meeting night. Details are below.

Following are the official details about the precinct meetings sent out by the Republican Party of Tulsa County:

Wagoner County residents face a Hobson's Choice at next month's school primary election. In November, the county settled a Federal wrongful-death lawsuit for $13.5 million. Wagoner County taxpayers are stuck with the bill, but they get to decide on February 11, 2025, whether to pay for it with a higher property tax or a higher sales tax.

On May 17, 2021, Angela Liggans, 41, was arrested for assault and battery against a police officer and was booked into Wagoner County jail. According to the complaint in federal court, Liggans was a Type 1 diabetic and was deprived of insulin by jail personnel for days. The complaint alleges that staff did not move her to emergency care despite skyrocketing blood sugar levels and hallucinations. She died at the jail 16 days after her arrest. Here is the complaint in the federal lawsuit, Liggans v. Elliott, via thetruthaboutwagonercounty.com. The lawsuit was filed by Liggans's mother, Sharon Dalton, who was appointed as Special Administrator of Liggans's estate in 2022.

The parties reached a settlement on August 16, 2024, which was entered on November 19, 2024. The county's insurance through the Association of County Commissioners of Oklahoma Self-Insured Group (ACCO-SIG) already paid the plaintiff $483,156.70, out of the county's $1 million maximum benefit; according to the County Commission resolution accepting the settlement, the remainder went to pay "attorney's fees and costs pursuant to the reducing liability coverage provided to Wagoner County in its liability protection plan." (Since the settlement, other parties have intervened in the probate of Liggans's estate, including someone claiming to be her common-law husband.)

To pay the settlement, Wagoner County will vote on a single sales tax proposition on Tuesday, February 11, 2025. The proposed sales tax increase is for a quarter of a cent on the dollar (0.25%) for up to 15 years, in order to satisfy the judgment levied against the county in a Federal lawsuit. If debt issued to pay the judgment is satisfied sooner, the sales tax increase ends sooner. Wagoner County currently has a 1.3% sales tax, which would increase to 1.55%, and several municipalities, including Coweta, Okay, Tullahassee, Porter, and Wagoner, would see their total sales tax rate, including state and municipal sales tax, go to 10.05%.

Here is the ballot language for the proposition:

A Proposition providing for funds for Wagoner County, Oklahoma; levying a one fourth of one percent (one-fourth cent) sales tax increase on gross receipts or proceeds on certain taxable sales; the sales tax increase to terminate on July 1, 2040 or until any debt issued in connection with said sales tax increase has been satisfied in full, whichever occurs sooner; such tax to be used to provide funds to pay and satisfy the balance due and owing on the judgment entered against Wagoner County in Case #23-CV-139-RAW-GLI in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma on November 19, 2024 by depositing said balance owed on the described judgment into the County's sinking fund to be used for that purpose and that purpose only; authorizing the payment of debt service and costs of issuance; fixing an effective date; making provisions severable.

(An election-systems gripe: The above is from a ballot image that was texted to me by someone who had received an absentee ballot for the election; the sample ballot was not available in the Oklahoma Voter Portal on Tuesday, possibly because there was an election for Wagoner County voters in the Inola Public Schools district that day. In order to look at sample ballots for jurisdictions other than my own, I have to find a voter in that jurisdiction from the voter database and enter his name and date of birth. The state election board needs to make all sample ballots directly and publicly accessible, with a permanent link for sharing, and they ought to be accessible as soon as the ballots have been ordered.)

Here is the ballot resolution, approved by the County Commissioners on December 2, 2024, which defines more precisely what Wagoner voters would be approving on February 11, 2025. Sections 5 indicates that the Commissioners intend to issue revenue bonds against the sales-tax proceeds, so there would be additional costs -- debt service and costs of issuance -- beyond the settlement itself. Section 6 means that a bank or banks in Wagoner County will get to make some money off of these revenue bonds, which would not be the case if the settlement were paid from the sinking fund.

SECTION 5. The sales tax shall be limited to a period of Fifteen Years (15) from the effective date or until any debt issued to satisfy the purpose set forth herein has been satisfied whichever occurs sooner. Any debt issued pursuant to this resolution shall allow prepayment in whole or in part at any time with excess bond proceeds or excess sales tax collection.

SECTION 6. That any debt issued to be paid with this sales tax shall be offered through the underwriter with banks located in Wagoner County to be given an opportunity to participate in the financing either through bonds purchased by the local bank or banks.

(Section 6 is missing an "or" for its "either.")

A year ago, Wagoner County residents defeated 8 tax propositions that would have made existing temporary taxes permanent, added new taxes of a half-cent on the dollar, and added a 5% lodging tax. The three sales-tax increase propositions failed by 18% to 82%.

So what happens if Wagoner County voters say no to a sales tax this time?

By state law, court judgments are paid out of the county's sinking fund which is replenished by property tax. Each year, the county excise board calculates for the county, each municipality, and each school district how much money has to come out of the entity's sinking fund to make bond repayments and pay for court judgments. They take that number and divide it by the assessed value of property in the jurisdiction to calculate the necessary increase in the property tax millage rate for each entity. Here's an example of the Estimate of Needs completed by each taxing subdivision of the state: In the 2024-2025 Fiscal Year, Wagoner County has no sinking fund at all and no levy for a sinking fund because it had no obligations to pay from that fund. Exhibit Y, on page 106 of the PDF, shows that the total valuation excluding homesteads of Wagoner County is $892,586,381, which forms the denominator for all millage levy calculations.

The settlement in the case calls for the repayment of the balance of the settlement of $13,016,843.30 "in ten equal annual installments plus post-judgment interest compounded annually on the first day of January of each year," beginning May 1, 2026, with interest accruing from January 1, 2025, 4.96% for first three payments, then 6% thereafter. If I've understood the nuances correctly, each year's payment will decrease because the interest accrued each year will decrease as the principal is paid down.

My calculations put the first payment at $2,159,583.46 and the last at $1,379,785.39. That would be the numerator for the annual millage levy calculations. Assuming no growth at all, the sinking fund levy would be 2.42 in the 2025-2026 tax year and would decline to 1.55 in the 2034-2035 tax year, a property tax impact on a $200,000 home of $51.78 in the first year and $33.08 in the last. A FAQ on the County's website estimates a slightly lower amount, $41.77 in higher taxes the first year on a $200,000 home, then decreasing over time. If Wagoner County valuation grows by 5% a year (last year's growth was 8.7%), the sinking fund levy would be 2.30 in the 2025-2026 tax year and would decline to 0.95 in the 2034-2035 tax year.

Here are the property tax rates for Wagoner County for 2024-2025. They range from 74.58 mills in the Okay School District to 129.42 in the part of the Haskell School District in the city limits of Bixby. The portion of that millage that goes into county government's general fund is 10.31 mills. Currently the county has no sinking fund nor do any of the municipalities based in the county. (Tulsa, Catoosa, Broken Arrow, and Bixby, which all have some territory in Wagoner County, have sinking-fund obligations.)

The Wagoner County website has a Frequently-Asked Questions page on the proposed tax increase, which acknowledges that each method for paying the settlement has its advantages.

Taxpayers might ask why this burden should fall on them. Well, you elected the official responsible. When it comes to the jail, the buck stops with the sheriff, who was just re-elected by Wagoner County voters to another four-year term. Sheriff Chris Elliott had two Republican primary challengers last June and was forced into a runoff with Tyler Cooper. Elliott won the runoff and re-election by just 35 votes, 4,327 to 4,292. Only Republican candidates filed for the office.

Note that the mandatory two-month gaps between filing in April, June primary, August runoff, and November general elections mean that a lot can come to light between filing and the election, too late for candidates to jump in to the race. When I was a kid, filing was in July, three months later. Perhaps we need a None-of-the-Above option on the general election ballot, to give voters a final option to say no in response to late-breaking scandal and force a special election.

There is a perverse incentive for Oklahoma government entities to settle a lawsuit: Paying for insurance comes out of the budget. Paying lawyers to defend a lawsuit comes out of the budget. Operational improvements to avoid lawsuits come out of the budget. But a lawsuit judgment or settlement comes out of the sinking fund, which does not eat into the elected officials' budget. In 2008, Tulsa Mayor Kathy Taylor agreed to a settlement with the Bank of Oklahoma, regarding Great Plains Airlines, that cost Tulsa taxpayers $7.1 million dollars. It was no skin off her nose when she agreed to the settlement, and it undoubtedly made her corporate cronies happy. Happily for taxpayers, the Oklahoma Supreme Court threw the settlement out, and BOK was forced to repay the City of Tulsa.

The Wagoner County FAQ addresses a couple of the obvious questions.

Why can't the county sell property or pay for it some other way?

State statute governs the way judgements are to be paid through a sinking fund. The tax levy,either sales tax or property tax, must be sufficient in itself to repay the debt. If collections exceed projections, the tax must be stopped at that time even if it is prior to the end of the stated term of the tax. The county cannot lawfully collect more than is due. The county can commit other funds (such as use tax) to the sinking fund in an effort to retire the debt early if the commissioners decide to do so.

Why can't they just take it out of the Sheriff's budget?

The Sheriff's office is a Constitutional Office, meaning it is first in the priority of funding for the county along with other Constitutional offices. The governing boards are bound by statute and the State Constitution to provide for law enforcement for the county. The Sheriff's office does have other funds by which to operate his office, however they are restricted for that purpose and cannot be used to pay for a judgement. The statutes provide for judgements to be paid for with a sinking fund instead.

Note the acknowledgment that the county could choose to draw on other, unrestricted funds (such as use-tax revenue) to pay toward the settlement and retire it early.

Ken Yazel, the late Tulsa County Assessor, was a strong advocate for the idea that elected county officials had discretion to use more of their earmarked funds to cover operation of their offices related to the earmarked purposes, thus reducing the amount of money the officials would need from the general fund, freeing general fund money for capital improvements, rather than always asking the taxpayers for more. He wanted the law to require annual county budgets to account for all funds accessible to county officials, including carryover earmarked funds. State Rep. David Brumbaugh proposed such a bill in 2013, but it died in the Appropriations and Budget Committee. I seem to recall that State Rep. Pam Peterson had a similar bill some years earlier, but pulled it at the request of county officials who promised to adopt similar reforms voluntarily.

If I were a Wagoner County voter, I would vote against the sales tax and then tell my elected officials (especially the two County Commissioners up for election next year) that I'll be watching to see if they can free up money from their budgets so that not all of the cost of this settlement falls on property owners.

Well, it's filing time again; I know you're busy.
I can see that far-away look in your eye.
You've got Christmas gifts to buy, and weather's freezing,
But there's just one day to go of filing time.

As many readers are no doubt aware, I am a board member of Tulsa Classical Academy, the first classical charter school and first Hillsdale K-12 member school in Oklahoma. TCA is in its second year of operation, and early next year will be the fifth anniversary of the initial meetings to organize the school, convened by founding board president Nathan Phelps in 2020 just before the pandemic. (What I'm about to say is my opinion only, well-grounded though it is, and does not represent TCA, the TCA board, administration, faculty, students, or parents.)

One of the distinctive characteristics of TCA is that we are unapologetically patriotic, and inspiring a love of the United States of America is one of our educational goals and one of the goals of the Hillsdale curriculum. If you walk the halls of TCA, you will see a display of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights (including the two articles that were not approved with the other ten). There is a collection of portraits of great Americans. At the main entrance there is a reproduction of the painting of Washington crossing the Delaware River.

The 1776 Curriculum, the American history and civics portion of the Hillsdale K-12 program, doesn't ignore or gloss over the tragic aspects of our history. The introduction to the 1776 Curriculum includes the following in the list of truths on which the curriculum is based:

• That civic knowledge, personal virtue, patriotism, respect for the rule of law, and civil free speech are absolutely necessary for young students to learn for a free and self-governing society to persevere.
• That the more important thing in American history is that which has endured rather than that which has passed, that is, America's founding principles which have outlasted and extinguished from law various forms of evil, such as slavery, racism, and other violations of the equal protection of natural rights.
• That although the United States of America is by no means perfect, it is unprecedented in the annals of human history for the extraordinary degrees of freedom, peace, and prosperity available to its people and to those who immigrate to her shores.
• That these unprecedented benefits are the result of its founding ideas and of those who have bravely sacrificed to prove these principles true--the principles that all men are created equal in their human dignity and possession of certain natural rights, that government exists solely to protect these rights and to promote the public good, and that people ought to govern themselves and respect the rights of one another.
• That for these reasons, America is an exceptionally good country.

These sentiments were still the majority view when I was in school and universally held during my parents' school days. Instilling a unifying national pride and affection in natives and the children of immigrants alike was one of the overt aims of the public education system.

There's a perception out there that TCA is the only unapologetically patriotic, the only non-woke free public school in the Tulsa metro area. I doubt that's true. I hope that isn't true. But that perception may lead some parents to want their children to attend TCA, even if they don't particularly like Hillsdale K-12's strongly structured approach to learning, the uniforms, the memorization and recitation, the focus on desk work and listening quietly to the teacher. There may well be a market for a patriotic Montessori charter school, a proudly American Charlotte Mason-style classical charter school, or a flag-waving choose-your-own-adventure charter un-school, but none of those is what TCA aspires to be.

The real question is why there are so few (or perceived to be so few) free public schools in the Tulsa metro area where conservative parents feel confident that what they are teaching their children at home about America, the Christian faith, Western Civilization, sex and sexuality, morals and manners, won't be undermined by educational missionaries seeking to convert Oklahoma's children away from the benighted views of their parents to the glories of progressive dogma. There was a time when local parents hired the school teacher directly and made very sure that he or she not only shared their values but lived in accordance with them. Now teachers are produced by progressive college departments of education, and the elected school board members who are supposed to represent the taxpayers and parents are supposed to shut up and just find money for whatever curriculum the progressive professionals deem appropriate. If elected board members and elected legislators and the elected State Superintendent try to direct and shape the curriculum, they're denounced as "politicizing" the schools.

If you want your public schools to reflect your love of America, you need to elect school board members who not only share that love but will take office with the confidence that they have the right and the obligation to direct the curriculum of your school district. Plenty of school board members who are personally conservative have been convinced that they must not wield their authority in any way; they are merely to rubber-stamp the superintendent's agenda and make sure the money keeps flowing.

The time to do something about that is right now.

Public schools are meant to serve the public interest,
But the lefties say that "All your kids are mine!"
They use public schools to push their own agenda,
And our only remedy is filing time.

Tomorrow, December 4, 2024, is the final day of the three-day filing period for public school board seats in Oklahoma, including regular public school districts and technology center districts. This year once again, the filing period falls right after Thanksgiving weekend and at the beginning of Advent and the Christmas rush, as our thoughts and energies are focused on faith and family.

(By the way, it's also filing period for bills for next year's legislative session. If you don't like having school board filing in December right after Thanksgiving and the elections at a time when few are paying attention, tell your state representative and state senator to file a bill moving school board elections to November -- when people expect to go to the polls -- in odd-numbered years -- when school board races won't get lost in the noise of federal and state races.)

This year only one seat, Office No. 5, is up for election in the vast majority of independent school districts, which have five school board members. (Dependent K-8 districts have 3 seats, and Office No. 2 is on the ballot this year.) Tulsa Public Schools has a seven-member board and has two seats, No. 2 and No. 3 on the ballot. Oklahoma City has a district-wide elected school board chairman up for election as well as two seats, Offices No. 1 and 2.

The primary election in all districts will be February 11, 2025, with a general election on April 1, 2025. If only two candidates file for a seat, the election will be on April 1. If more than two file, an election will be held on February 11 with a runoff on April 1 if no candidate receives a majority of the vote.

In Tulsa County, after two days of filing, only one candidate, typically the incumbent, has filed in the vast majority of school board seats. No candidates at all have filed for seats in Collinsville and Owasso.

On the Tulsa Public Schools board, Calvin Moniz, who won a special election this past spring to fill the unexpired Office No. 2 term, is on the ballot for a full term and is opposed by Khadija Goz, a Democrat Party activist.

Rick Kibbe, the incumbent in Tulsa Technology Center Office No. 2, is opposed for re-election by Todd Blackburn; Kibbe retired as Superintendent of Catoosa Public Schools in 2017. Blackburn, CEO of Techsico, serves on the board of the Tulsa Tech Educational Foundation.

Incumbent Tulsa Office No. 3 board member Dr. Jennettie Marshall has not yet filed for re-election; Dorie Simmons, a real estate agent, is the only candidate to file for the seat so far.

It's also filing period for City Council in Owasso and Sand Springs.

Here's the full list of Tulsa County school board filings through the end of Tuesday:

• Berryhill Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Dusty Hutchison, 39, Tulsa

• Bixby Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Pablo Aguirre, 40, Bixby

• Broken Arrow Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Jerry Denton (i), 59, Broken Arrow
• Bruce Allen Lamont, 48, Broken Arrow
• Kate Williams, 40, Broken Arrow

• Collinsville Public Schools, Office No. 5
• NO CANDIDATES

• Glenpool Public Schools, Office No. 2
• Michael Rhine (i), 36, Glenpool

• Glenpool Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Amber Leiser (i), 36, Glenpool

• Jenks Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Chuck Forbes (i), 53, Tulsa

• Keystone Public Schools, Office No. 2
• Clay Biggerstaff (i), 43, Sand Springs

• Liberty Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Brent W. Hickerson, 43, Mounds

• Owasso Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Frosty Turpen (i), 67, Owasso

• Sand Springs Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Alesha Spoon, 38, Sand Springs

• Skiatook Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Aleen Joy McLain (i), 54, Skiatook

• Sperry Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Johnny Holmes (i), 45, Sperry

• Tulsa Public Schools, Office No. 2
• Khadija Goz, 39, Tulsa
• Calvin Moniz (i), 39, Tulsa

• Tulsa Public Schools, Office No. 3
• Dorie Simmons, 50, Tulsa
• Kyra Carby, 39, Tulsa
• Brandi Joseph, 49, Tulsa
• Eartha McAlester, 46, Tulsa

• Tulsa Tech Center Office No. 2
• Todd Blackburn, 51, Tulsa
• Rick Kibbe (i), 66, Catoosa

• Union Public Schools, Office No. 5
• Steve Nguyen (i), 45, Tulsa

Tulsa County candidates should file for office at the Tulsa County Election Board, 555 N. Denver Ave., Tulsa. Filing for the 2025 school board election ends at 5 p.m., Wednesday, December 4, 2024. You'll find a packet of forms and instructions on the Tulsa County Election Board website.

UPDATED 2024/12/06: Filing is now final. Italics indicate candidates who filed on Wednesday after this article was first published. Both Tulsa Public Schools races are contested, as is the seat in Broken Arrow. The incumbent finally filed for the Owasso seat, but the Collinsville seat drew no candidates, and the remaining school board members will have to appoint a replacement.