Deadlines loom for schools, kid insurance passes  
Capitol Report for dailies for week of March 11, 2007
By Jim Campbell
OPA Capitol News Bureau
One school district already has moved toward layoffs to cope with unfunded benefit costs 
linked to last year's legislative-mandated teacher pay raises and the calendar is flipping 
toward temporary insolvency for others.
Help is expected by the April 1 target for funding education, legislative leaders indicate. 
But education lobbyists say supplements for schools as well as corrections could be tied 
to agreement on the budget as a whole between the Republican controlled House and the 
evenly-divided Senate.
"Everyone recognizes that deadlines are approaching," said Sen. Co-President Glenn 
Coffee, R-Oklahoma City. "I feel progress is being made."
Whether the extra funding depends on agreement on the entire general appropriations 
bill, he said, is "one of the discussions we're having."
 The Catoosa school board voted last week to begin the process of considering employees 
for layoff after an auditor projected local costs related to the pay raises at more than 
$250,000.
 The State Board of Education voted last December to seek $58.3 million in supplemental 
funding to cover the extra costs from the $3,000 teacher pay raises and other expenses. 
Fixed payroll costs have been estimated at more than $400 for each teacher each year.
The governor has proposed supplemental funding of about $50.3 million this fiscal year 
to pay retirement and Social Security costs.
Some lawmakers are expressing frustration.  
Sen. Kathleen Wilcoxson, co-chair of the Senate Education Committee, blamed former 
Sen. Stratton Taylor, D-Claremore, who was term-limited last year.
"I'm still mad at Sen. Taylor," she said. "I asked him please put the money through the 
formula and make sure we cover the unfunded benefits," said Wilcoxson, R-Oklahoma 
City. "He said they could take it out of their local ad valorem."
Sen. Jeff Rabon, D-Hugo, said, "I just wish we'd get it done."
Schools are pinched two ways, an Oklahoma Education Association representative said. 
First, by the benefit costs associated with the pay raise, and secondly by a declining 
percentage of state revenue in face of rising expenses for fuel, utilities and other needs.
March 15 marks a major legislative deadline, when bills must be considered on the floor 
of the chamber of origin. Senate co-Floor Leader Charles Laster, D-Shawnee, and Owen 
Laughlin, R-Woodward, said about 140 bills were left to be heard in the Senate before 
they die on the vine. Laster expected that about 30 bills a day would be considered.
Cherished measures advanced from each chamber in recent days are likely to face 
tougher going across the rotunda.
HHH
Oklahoma has a chance to become a state where nearly every child has access to health 
insurance, should the House adopt a Senate-passed bill and the legislation works as 
intended.  
A bill proposed early by Gov. Brad Henry and carried to a floor victory by the 
Democratic and Republican co-chairs of the Senate Health and Social Services 
Committee would provide that access to as many as 42,000 more children.
Six Republicans joined 22 Democrats in a 28-14 vote for Senate Bill 424, expanding the 
Medicaid eligibility for children from 185 percent of the poverty level to the federal 
maximum of 300 percent.
Chico Gomez, spokesman for the Medicaid-administering Oklahoma Health Care 
Authority, put the number potentially benefiting at 42,000.
"But the thing it says to Oklahoma is that almost every child in Oklahoma would have 
access to health insurance no matter the (family) income," Gomez said.
SB 424, called the All Kids Act, also includes Postponing Sexual Involvement, a five-
lesson program where trained high school teens lead discussions about peer pressure, 
media messages and refusal skills.
In presenting the bill on the Senate floor, Sen. Brian Crain, R-Tulsa, committee co-chair, 
quipped, "This is another bit of great Republican legislation."
To which Sen. Randy Brogdon, R-Owasso, replied that he wanted to make it clear that 
Crain was speaking facetiously.
"I prefer to call it just a good government bill," Crain said later.
Ed McFall, OHAC member from Frederick who was in the gallery, called it "just a great 
government bill."
Ann Roberts, executive director of the Oklahoma Institute for Child Advocacy, said the 
projected cost of the act is $8.57 million, with the federal government adding an 
estimated $29.99 million, for a total program of $38.45 million.
She said national reports indicate family health insurance premiums will increase by 
$2,011 by 2019 because of cost-shifting from the uninsured.
"There are simply too many uninsured in Oklahoma and too many of those uninsured are 
children," said Henry in a statement issued while he was in Afghanistan visiting military 
personnel.
Oklahoma children whose parents make up to $37,000 a year are now eligible for 
Medicaid. The bill would lift the ceiling to $60,000.
Senate President Pro Tempore Mike Morgan, D-Stillwater, credited both Adelson and 
Crain for the Senate success.
"By far the largest group among the uninsured in our state are children who honestly fall 
through the cracks," said Morgan. "Their parents don't make enough to afford health 
insurance but make too much to be eligible for Medicaid."