City councilors rejected an idea Tuesday to share the city's 0.167-cent sales tax with Tulsa County and instead said they may extend a small "peace offering" in hopes that the county will delay its own proposal for such a tax.
Councilor G.T. Bynum suggested setting aside $5 million in the city's $918.6 million capital improvements proposal toward a county juvenile justice center, saying the city would pledge to support and help develop a countywide funding proposal this spring to complete the funding.
"The idea being that the city would commit to say that we will work in the fall and the winter and the spring with county leaders and with our colleagues in cities that surround Tulsa ... to bring forward a comprehensive criminal justice proposal in the spring," Bynum said.
He said such a proposal might not only include the juvenile justice center, but jail improvements and Mayor Dewey Bartlett's recent proposal to increase the city's public safety manpower with a 0.167-cent tax.
For nearly a year, city officials have been discussing temporarily extending Tulsa's 0.167-cent share of the county's former 4 to Fix tax to fund $65 million worth of projects in their funding package, which focuses on transportation and other capital needs.
Councilors plan to vote Thursday to send the measure to voters Nov. 12.
Tulsa County officials announced plans in late July to seek a countywide vote on the same day to enact a new permanent 0.167-cent tax to fund a new juvenile justice center and additional pods at the Tulsa Jail.
The idea to share the 0.167-cent tax has come from private meetings between Commissioner Karen Keith, Sheriff Stanley Glanz, two city councilors, and Mayor Dewey Bartlett and his staff.
City councilors said at a committee meeting Tuesday that they strongly oppose sharing the tax because it would be significantly changing the city's capital improvements package after nearly a year of crafting the proposal and gathering public feedback at town hall meetings.
Several councilors, however, said they said they favor or at least would be open to including $5 million for the juvenile justice center.
Bynum said the proposal would likely be incorporated into the city's package when councilors vote to call the election Thursday night -- if the backers of the county's proposal agree to it.
Keith attended the council's committee meeting but was not invited to speak. She could not immediately be reached for comment.
The juvenile justice center would cost at least $40 million, county officials estimate.
"I've gotten numerous, numerous compliments on how well we as a council have put this package together and how we've gone out and gotten citizen input," Councilor Karen Gilbert said. "And I think to change it ... would be a disservice to the citizens of Tulsa.
She added that Bynum's suggestion "is a great compromise."
Councilors Jack Henderson, however, said he opposes that compromise because the public has not had a chance to examine that proposal, unlike the other projects in the city's package.
Council Chairman David Patrick added that the city's $5 million could end up going unused for years if the county does not succeed in its own funding proposal.
The county is in the midst of a petition drive to hold a special election Nov. 12 for its proposal. For the election to be called, 5 percent of registered voters in Tulsa County at the time of the last general election, or approximately 17,777 voters, would have to sign the petition.
Keith, however, has suggested that the county would simply vote to call an election if those signatures are not collected.
Local Politics
City voters on Nov. 12 will consider separate ballot propositions to extend 1.1 percent in sales taxes up to seven years for $563.7 million in roadwork and other capital improvements projects and to issue $355 million in general obligation bonds mainly for nonarterial roadwork.
Mayor Dewey Bartlett and former Mayor Kathy Taylor have eight weeks to make their cases before voters go to the polls Nov. 12.
