OKLAHOMA CITY — A controversial toll road plan being touted by the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority cleared the Oklahoma Supreme Court last week, on a 6-3 vote.
Known as ACCESS Oklahoma, the turnpike expansion plan would cost about $5 billion and a portion of the plan would target homes in southern Cleveland County. Homeowners in the area have protested the project and have taken their complaints to court.
Last week’s ruling clears the way for the Turnpike Authority to sell bonds to finance the plan.
“This bond validation creates certainty for OTA, its bondholders and citizens who now know without doubt that these final three legs of the Oklahoma City Outer Loop meet the legislative intent to provide reliever routes through the metro area and fight increasing traffic congestion,” State Transportation Secretary Tim Gatz told The Oklahoman newspaper. “This allows one of the most ambitious state transportation plans in Oklahoma history to move forward. It will increase safety and travel reliability, provide new connections to communities and improve traffic flow by integrating with the state highway system.”
The high court’s moderate wing carried the vote. Writing for the majority, Justice James Winchester said the Turnpike Authority has the authorization to build an expansion. “The Court has consistently honored the discretion given to the OTA by the Legislature and allowed the OTA to exercise its judgment as the OTA has the engineering expertise and traffic data to make these complex far-reaching decisions regarding turnpike routes,” Winchester wrote. “We uphold the authority given to the OTA to decide routes for turnpikes and conclude that the OTA has the legislative authority to construct the South Extension that conforms to the location generally described in (state statutes).”
A ruling against the authority, Winchester wrote, would “inject this Court into the OTA’s decision-making process regarding proposed turnpike routes.”
“The court would not only be deciding the validity of the bonds but also substituting the OTA’s discretion with its own in choosing a route, which the Court has consistently refused to do,” Winchester wrote. “The Court--without technical expertise--would be required to perform a turn-by-turn analysis of every proposed turnpike route to determine if it falls within the very general turnpike locations described by the Legislature in 69 O.S.2021, § 1705(e). In other words, the Court would be restricting OTA’s authority by performing a more rigorous analysis of the OTA’s proposed turnpikes routes than what the Legislature generally described in § 1705(e). Any other conclusion by the Court would further require the OTA to seek approval for every route modification that might be necessary when constructing the proposed turnpikes, leading to protracted litigation and creating uncertainty for Oklahoma bonds in the financial markets.”
Opponents of the plan said the fight would continue.
Richard Labarthe, the attorney for the homeowners at the center of the fight, said other lawsuits and at least one state audit of the Turnpike Authority would continue.
“They are far out of the woods and their day of reckoning is still coming,” he said.
The three justices who opposed the plan said the Legislature gave the court the authority to examine the Turnpike Authority’s rulemaking process.
“I also wholeheartedly disagree with the majority’s characterization of the protests filed in this matter as an invitation for this court to ‘inject itself into the route-making process’ and impose upon the discretion of the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority (“OTA”),” Vice Chief Justice Dustin Rowe wrote in his dissent. “The Legislature vested this court with exclusive original jurisdiction to hear bond applications and determine their validity. Our obligation to review bond applications is well-established. We must determine whether the bonds facially violate the law and examine the legal authority presented by the protestants.”
The Legislature’s purpose in conferring this jurisdiction upon the court, Rowe wrote, “was to ensure that the OTA does not act outside the scope of its authority and discretion and thereby contravene the law of Oklahoma--thus, our review is crucial to our system of checks and balances.
“To rule upon the legitimacy of the protests filed in this matter--and the valid objections contained therein--is precisely why the Legislature vested this Court with exclusive jurisdiction to review these bond applications,” Rowe wrote.