Tulsa World editorial today:
Native American
Center lacks private fundingBy World's Editorial Writers
Published: 2/17/2012 2:27 AM
Last Modified: 2/17/2012 3:23 AM
The Legislature has been bombarded with state bond issue requests - about $1 billion worth - from various agencies. At the top of the list is the proposed $140 million in state borrowing to repair the crumbling state Capitol.
Another is a request for another $40 million from the state for the half-completed American Indian Cultural Center, located in Oklahoma City. Lawmakers should think hard and long before agreeing to that deal.
The cultural center already has received a total of $67.4 million from three state bond issues. In addition, the Legislature has appropriated $1.5 million a year to run the Native American Cultural and Educational Authority, which was created in 1994 to get the cultural center done. About $1 million a year of that has gone for staff salaries and benefits.
The authority has raised very little in private funds to help support the project.
Blake Wade, newly hired as the part-time head of the authority, and who has been connected with successful projects including the construction of the state Capitol dome, says that with another $40 million in hand the authority will raise $40 in private money.
Here's a better idea: The authority should raise $40 million from private donors first, and then ask for a similar amount in taxpayer-paid bond funds.
The fact is that the cultural center has received little support in the form of cash dollars from the private sector in the Oklahoma City area or from the tribes in central and western Oklahoma.
Otherwise this project, if it is ever completed, will be paid for entirely by the taxpayers of Oklahoma.
Read more from this Tulsa World article at
http://www.tulsaworld.com/opinion/article.aspx?subjectid=61&articleid=20120217_61_A16_TheLeg974606