OKLAHOMA LEGISLATURE
OKLAHOMA CITY – Funding for city and county roads and bridges, and “responsibilities and powers” of county commissioners, will be the focus of interim studies this summer and fall in the Oklahoma House of Representatives and Senate.
Sen. Paul Scott, R-Duncan, wants a study to determine adequate funding for maintaining and improving municipal and county roads and bridges. And Sen. Chuck Hall, R-Perry, seeks an evaluation of the County Improvements for Roads and Bridges (CIRB) fund. Both of those proposals were assigned to the Senate’s Appropriations Committee.
Rep. Ty Burns, R-Pawnee, proposed an interim House study of funding for county governments and for county roads. Rep. Kevin West, R-Moore, wants to examine the duties and powers of Oklahoma’s 231 county commissioners (three in each of the 77 counties).
And an interim legislative study of options for cities and towns to secure funding to construct, repair and maintain their roads and bridges “impacted by the energy industry” was requested by Reps. Brad Boles, R-Marlow; David Perryman, D-Chickasha; Sherrie Conley, R-Newcastle; and Cynthia Roe, R-Lindsay.
All three of those House studies were assigned to the County and Municipal Government Committee, whose members include Reps. Toni Hasenbeck, R-Elgin; Daniel Pae, R-Lawton; and Perryman.
Blanchard City Manager Robert Floyd told Perryman it costs $425,000 to rebuild a mile of road that has been destroyed.
Tuttle City Manager Tim Young told Perryman that full replacement – including grinding up the deteriorated asphalt pavement, cleaning and prepping the base, and laying down 3 inches of new asphalt paving – costs approximately $400,000 if the job is awarded to a contractor.
Speaker Charles McCall said each House study will be allotted four hours for a hearing, and the hearings must be held sometime between Aug. 4 and Oct. 29.
Perryman said he’d like to see a fund created to compensate municipalities for damages to their streets from oilfield vehicles. The fund would be similar to the one the Oklahoma Energy Resources Board depends on to finance restoration of abandoned oil well sites.
Voluntary contributions paid by producers and royalty owners have generated $120 million to restore more than 17,000 abandoned well sites in Oklahoma over the past 27 years. The OERB budgeted $9 million for oil patch environmental recovery projects throughout the state in Fiscal Year 2020, which ended June 30.
A portion of the state’s gross production tax revenue is allocated for county road maintenance. Perryman proposes earmarking a portion of that revenue for cities and towns whose roads are damaged by heavy oilfield trucks. His proposal wouldn’t raise the gross production tax; instead, it would divert to municipalities a portion of the GPT that’s allocated to counties for road construction/ maintenance.
“It’s not uncommon for 40 to 50 overweight trucks to travel to a well site for a fracking operation,” he said. Some Oklahoma municipalities “have road damage from oilfield traffic that’s every bit as severe as what counties are experiencing.”
Under the plan envisioned by Perryman, cities and towns could apply for financial assistance – perhaps 50/50 matching grants from the fund he proposes – to repair streets damaged by oilfield traffic.