Listening to our State of the State address this week and reading about just some of the literally thousands of bills being proposed for the now in session 2025 legislative buffet, I somehow feel Oklahoma lawmakers are missing the point about leading our state forward.
We have to get our public schools on a path to success. Otherwise, not much else matters.
Governor Stitt mentioned his focus on making Oklahoma an easier place to do business as a key to our continued success. Oklahoma was ranked 26th in CNBC’s Best States for Business in 2024. However, we ranked No. 1 by CNBC for Cost of Doing Business and 19th overall for Business Friendliness. Oklahoma City was ranked the 2nd best place for small business by Forbes Advisor in 2024, and a recent study by Arizona State University found OKC to be the easiest place in the country to do business. However, the CNBC rankings ranked Oklahoma 36th in Workforce, 47th Quality of Life and 40th in Education. If one were to aim to improve upon our overall rank of 26th, would it not make sense to focus on areas where we are underperforming?…