Weekly Local Dose ... Oct 2, 2009.

Some people need a shot of penicillin, others need an angioplasty... but that's not why you're here. So place your tray tables up and your seats in an upright position. It's time for your local dose of...

Inside The Mind Of Matt

Hi there Tulsa... let's skip right past the formalities and get this party started folks.

What's going on in the news? Oh boy... lots of stuff. What's good in the news? Oh here's something good folks... 14 Marines from Broken Arrow came home this week... if that's not good news I don't know what is. Here's some news that you first wouldn't think of as good, but, it is. This weekend, our elected officials and the Tulsa Fire Department will pay respects to 16 retired firefighters who have died since retiring. Why is that good news? Because our Tulsa firefighters have not lost a man in the line of duty in many decades. I'm glad to know these heroes survived to and beyond retirement. Let's pray we continue celebrating the lives of retired firefighters, and not those lost in the line of duty. Marines... we welcome you home. Fallen firefighters, we remember your service.

What else do we have in the news this week? Oh... this is interesting...

It would seem that 19 government employees in Oklahoma District 2 are receiving some disciplinary action for misusing tax payer owned equipment. It would seem they were taking our equipment to their homes and using it for some time. While I commend the district 2 commissioner for taking action, I have to say that I'm less than pleased with it. Although these numbers don't add up, this is what we know so far. 2 have been terminated, 1 demoted, 1 suspected, 6 have taken retirement and 7 others haven't decided if they will retire or be fired.

Wait... what? 7 people, who have committed acts which justify being fired, get to decide if they want to be fired or retire? Let me get this straight... perhaps I'm confused. They have a choice to be fired and get nothing, or to retire on the tax payers dime... I think the choice they are going to make is pretty obvious. 6 others have already taken the retirement option and I'm sure these other 7 will as well.

This is ridiculous folks... this is no different than the deal going on with Tulsa Fire. Someone needs to explain this to us tax payers because I frankly don't think any of us can understand this kind of stupidity.

Since when does committing acts worthy of termination buy you a free ticket to retirement? These people are trusted with our tax dollars. If they violate that to the point of justifying termination then they just need to be terminated. We shouldn't be paying for these people to retire folks. I'm not saying throw them in jail for misappropriating the use of equipment... that would be stupid as well... I'm saying fire them. It should not be an option. If the action is only worthy of suspension or demotion then so be it. But if this is worthy of termination then termination needs to occur.

Folks... these types of actions set standards which will occur again in the future. Employees will learn exactly what they can and can't get away with. They'll take advantage of our hard earned tax dollars and they'll learn how to do it just far enough that they won't get fired, but will instead receive a tax payer supplied salary for the rest of their lives. Stupid... just plain stupid.

Let's move on.

It looks like the religious sect is up in arms over Senate Bill 1725... it seems I'm going to have to take them to school on the Constitution. SB 1725 will require the property owner of a church to have their name clearly listed on the deed. Religious zealots who probably couldn't understand staying in the lines of a children's coloring book also seem to have misinterpreted the Constitution. They are making a big fuss about this because they say it violates their rights and infringes upon their liberties. No it doesn't folks. Concerning religion, the 1st amendment states, and I quote, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion; or prohibiting the free exercise thereof". Requiring the actual land owners name to be on a deed in no way prohibits anyone from exercising their religion. Furthermore, by requiring them to play by the same rules as the general public, they are playing by the first part, "no law respecting an establishment of religion". This means no playing favorites, no special treatment and no recognition folks. If we really want to get technical about things, the tax shelter a church affords is unconstitutional. Perhaps it is in their best interests to learn what their rights actually are, because truly, if we followed the 1st amendment here, they would not receive a tax exempt status. Just imagine what those tax dollars could pay for folks. Maybe I'll ask my Senator to start looking into this.

Oh... hey... I found more good news folks.

The Tulsa Stadium Trust voted to spend $2.2 million more dollars of that $25 million dollars it may or may not receive from the illegal downtown property assessment fee. This $2.2 million dollars is going to pay for streetscaping. Interesting... we can't afford police or firefighters and have to furlough them, but we can afford streetscaping for a baseball park.

This just keeps getting better. This thing still hasn't played itself out through the State Supreme Court (unless it happened and I didn't know it) yet our city is still spending money that it doesn't know it will have. Interestingly enough, even if this stays in the favor of the assessment fee, they still won't have the money. Small business owners shagged hind end when it went through and more will follow in suit. No one can afford increases from a few hundred or thousand dollars to tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars. This money will ultimately come out of the pocket of us tax paying citizens folks. You watch... it will.

What else, what else, what else....

So today, I've had a slow, but busy day at work. Ultimately, it gave me a lot of time to think about things and come up with some pretty darn good ideas that I believe will solve some problems for our city and state.

It seems the city has a little issue to handle. Not too long ago Mayor Taylor decided she wanted a big pretty building for City Hall. After exhaustive debate, the City Council agreed to purchase One Technology Center. For those of you who are unfamiliar, I'll catch you up really fast.

The old City of Tulsa City Hall was a little ran down... paid for... but ran down. One Technology Center, nearly vacant at the time and just around the corner, was available for purchase. Our City Council designed a model that allowed them to purchase this building. The idea proposed that keeping up with repairs on the old building would ultimately be more expensive than getting a nicely polished new one. Their idea included renting out the space not used by the city for $16 and $18 per square foot, and using that to make up the cost, thus breaking even.

Problem...

It's an open floor building folks... 48,000 square foot open floors at that. No one wants that much space. The amount of space used, on average, is about 22,000 feet. This is leaving the city, AKA, the tax payer, with a $1.2 million dollar operating cost this year. And it's not going to get better. One City Councilor said the city, at this rate, can only support this type of deficit through 2012. And let's be honest, energy prices are not going down. You would have to be a fool to not expect this price tag to continually rise.

So what's the answer? Well...here's a start. Turn the lights off at night... seriously. While I don't know what the electric bill for this building is on a monthly basis, I'm willing to bet we could cut 60% of it, if not more, by turning all those lights off at night and on weekends.

(Photo found here.)

Moving on...

While I completely agree with the need to beef up the Tulsa Police Department, I don't believe this moment in time was the best choice. The City Councilors voted 7-2 to accept $3.5 million from the C.O.P.S. Grant. This federal dough will provide 18 officers for 3 years, less training expenses which are a little under $400,000.00. Here's the problem folks...

The grant requires the City of Tulsa to pay for the 4th year, which will cost about $1.3 million dollars. Does anyone want to take a wild guess when the 4th year is? Mayor Taylor announced, just after approvel, that the new officers would begin an academy in January. (I assume that's this coming January of 2010.) This means the grant will pay for 2010, 2011 and 2012, leaving the tax payer with the burden of providing the $1.3 million in 2013.

WAIT!

Didn't we JUST have a big discussion with our City Councilors about a big deficit problem after 2012. As noted above, the extra $1.2 million operating cost for the new City Hall can only be supported until 2012... which means... come on... put it together with me... After 2012, not only will we be trying to figure out how to meet the $1.2 million we can't afford for the City Hall, but we'll be trying to come up with another $1.3 million to comply with the C.O.P.S. Grant.

Folks... the City of Tulsa needs more Officers... I won't argue this. But this way, in this period of time, is not the way to do it. I commend our Tulsa Cops for doing what they are able to do with the man power they have. Many people blame high crime rates on our cops. I blame it on citizens who waste their time with issues they should have never called the police for in the first place. I blame it on law makers who force our cops to handle issues that shouldn't even be matters of law to begin with. I blame it on a lot of things... but I do not blame it on our cops. I've seen them in action and I know what they do. For the man power they have, believe me, they do a fantastic job.

However, there must come a realization and a truth here which everyone thinks, but no one wants to say... and that is this. Police do not stop crime, police investigate crime and lock up the people who commit crime. Don't get me wrong, police do detour, and indeed, do stop some crimes. But for the most part, crime is going to occur whether you have one cop or a thousand cops. So what's the answer?

City Counsilors say the answer is more cops. One of them actually said people will move to the subarbs and quit shopping in town if crime continues to go up. I've got news for you sir, Chicago, New York and Washington D.C. have more cops than you can shake a stick at and their crime rates are through the roof.

Let me ask each of you a question... Do you organize your daily planner based on the current crime rates in the area you will be traveling to? Do you go to the bank based on statistical data of when banks are least likely to be robbed? Do you go shopping at the grocery store based on whether or not a crime is going to be committed?

I know a lot of people who try to use banks and grocery stores in either very early or very late hours. Their plan is to go when the largest amount of consumers don't frequent the destination, thus reducing the overall time spent in line. The funny thing about doing that is that most crimes occur during those times. Criminals don't like confrontation. Less people present means decreased chance for confrontation.

While some people do choose to visit a particular area based on the appearance and what they assume must be a high crime area, this is not going to effect the City of Tulsa at large. The big money makers will still be frequented and the city will still bring in the bacon. So again I ask... what's the answer to this crime problem?

You are... the citizen... the business owner... the employee. You... the individual, are the answer.

I've said it before and I'll say it again... no amount of law has ever stopped a crime from being committed. If a criminal wants to break a law, no amount of laws or possible jail time is going to detour him (or her... have to be politically correct). The only true detourant to crime is what? Fear.

Criminals are cowards folks... You may fear them... but they are cowards. Criminals do not prey on someone who can play at the same level. Criminals focus their attention on easy targets. What, or rather, who, are easy targets? The unarmed... period. It doesn't matter your skin color, gender, age or place of business... if you're unarmed, you are their target. What's the solution? Arm yourself.

If the city wants to reduce crime then the city needs to take a proactive approach to doing so by reducing the target area. Think of it like an antihistamine. The antihistamine doesn't stop what's going on, it attaches itself to the targeted receptors and blocks the histamine from doing what it's trying to do. Armed citizens are no different. When you place a gun between the criminal and their target, you stop what they are trying to do. How many of these cowardly characters are going to rob a bank if they know the tellers are armed? How many people rob a night clerk at the 24 hour corner store if they know the tellers are armed? And how many people are going to walk up and attempt to commit acts of violence against you if they know you are armed?

We need an open carry law in this state folks... it already exist... it's just being unconstitutionally blocked.

I want you to think about this for a minute folks... and I mean really think about it.

Has any law maker ever wrote a law to protect free speech? Have they ever wrote a law to protect the press? Have they ever wrote a law pertaining to any of the rights of the people, exluding the 2nd? The answer is no. Many states have adopted the Constitution and expanded upon it, but nothing has ever been devised to improve or restrict. If the media was messed with, they simply claim their 1st amendment rights.

So tell me... why is it, when it comes to our right to keep and bear arms, are there literally thousands of restrictions and pieces of red tape regulating how, when, where and what we can carry? Should we not be able to just as easily claim our 2nd amendment right and be allowed to go on our way? Should we even have to remind our government that we have it in the first place? Why is it being questioned to begin with? Honestly... that's an issue for another day...

Getting back on track...

We, the people, not the government, but us, are responsible for protecting ourselves and we need to demand our lawmakers make this easier for us. The city can't figure out how to reduce crime... the state can't figure it out... so here it is elected officials... let us put those antihistamines between the histamine and the target... let us, the people, do what we did so well for over 200 years... before the government began restricting our rights. You can reduce crime without a single tax increase, a need to hire more cops, a need for more laws or any other effect on the budget... other than helping it of course. You folks have to get on board and call your city leaders. The City of Tulsa is not exactly a small part of Oklahoma... it does have influence. You need to tell your elected city officials to get on the phone and start demanding the State Legislature write and pass open carry laws. And don't stop there... turn around and call the State Legislators... you pay to put them there... at least make them put up with your phone calls.

Well folks... I hope you have enjoyed reading this very first edition of the weekly local dose as much as I have enjoyed writing it. I'll see you next week and I'll see you midweek with the national dose. This is Matthew Q. Llewellyn saying, "I bid you good day".