We now have the outcome of the Tulsa Elections. Former Councilor Dewey Bartlett, Jr., will be the next mayor, assuming office on December 7.

He has now announced that the chairman of his “transition team” will be Congressman John Sullivan. This bothers me, in that the congressman is employed by the citizens of the First Congressional District to represent them in the U.S. House, which is in session, and it appears the House will be so for most of the time until the swearing in ceremony. There is so much going on in Congress that it offends me that he would attempt to take on the added responsibilities. Councilor Bartlett was not my first choice in the primary, primarily because of his actions in the Great Plains Airline situation and his support of Mayor Taylor in 2006 and again in 2009 (until she withdrew from the race). He has a great deal to do to convince me that he is the conservative he claims to be.

It would appear that he has been handed not a can of worms but a bucket of snakes by the outgoing mayor and staff. Hopefully, he will dispense with the large number of high-paid assistants she has imposed on the populace and conduct operations in a more open manner, starting with the City Hall which has been highly secured, at much expense, and lacks convenient parking facilities, particularly for the elderly and handicapped.

There have been some changes in the City Council that may portend a better oversight of the administration actions, rather than a mostly rubber stamp that has been the situation in the past three years. Changes in Districts 3, 4, 5 and 6 will, hopefully, bring about a more active questioning of mayoral actions and proposal. Past actions on the Council of Roscoe Turner and Jim Mautino are expected to be renewed and continued to the benefit of the city and its population.

Along that line, it was reported in the November 17 daily paper that a staff member announced that lowered project bids have left substantial funds that can be used on other projects. The story indicated some of the projects to be brought into the mix shall include several of the arterial streets. Unfortunately, very few of these are located in South Tulsa where the arterial streets are nothing more than original county roads, although in most cases there is sufficient right-of-way for them to be widened to four lanes plus left-turn lane in the middle.

It is unfortunate that some recent rebuilding projects, such as Lewis Avenue from 31st Street South to 41st Street South did not involve even widening of the existing lanes, which were built in the 1950s when standard procedures were to only make the lanes 10 feet wide instead of the presently used 12 feet, thus resulting in tight fits, especially when there are trucks on the street. Unfortunately, the story did not say anything about widening Lewis Avenue from 61st Street to 71st Street, although this was promised to be done in the early 1980s, but postponed because of the PGA tournament at Southern Hills Country Club.

It was also reported to me, by a member of the Council, that the rebuilding of Peoria Avenue from 21st Street to 31st Street was scheduled to include widening to five lanes but that was scrubbed because of complaints of nearby residents who “wanted to keep it just the way it was,” all this to the danger to those using the street that is still far too narrow for traffic of today. It has occurred to me that maybe the root cause was that they did not want to lose any of their yard area. It has been proposed by me that an ordnance be passed to require any arterial being repaired or rebuilt to be widened, but it has not been considered.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 27th, 2009 and is filed under Columns.