The Senate and House budget committees responsible for oversight of public safety programs, including the state prison system, will conduct joint budget review hearings for the first time in recent memory.State Sen. Anthony Sykes and State Rep. Randy Terrill, both R-Moore, announced the move today, saying Republican control of both chambers of the Legislature has made the cooperative effort feasible for the first time in recent memory.
“The joint meeting will also allow greater scrutiny of agency budget requests and a better review of their current expenditures,” said Sykes, who chairs the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Public Safety and Judiciary.“It never made sense for state agency officials to spend hours presenting their budget on one side of the Capitol and then force them to walk across the building and repeat the process a second time,” said Terrill, who chairs the House Appropriations and Budget Subcommittee on Public Safety & Judiciary. “We believe streamlining the budget review process will make better use of limited time and taxpayer resources.”
“For the first time in years, House and Senate members will have access to the same information because we’ll actually be in the same room hearing the same information at the same time. This is the kind of common-sense approach to government that has been lacking at the Capitol.”
The two committees have oversight of 17 state agencies with a combined budget of approximately $800 million – the largest agency of the lot is the Department of Corrections, which has an annual budget of more than $500 million.
The committees will conduct three joint hearings – one on Jan. 15 Performance Evaluation: Attorney General, Department of Public Safety, another on Jan. 21 Performance Evaluation: Department of Corrections, Court of Criminal Appeals, Supreme Court/District Courts and the final one on Jan. 28 Performance Evaluation: State Fire Marshal, Pardon and Parole Board, Oklahoma Indigent Defense System.
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