I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving holiday! Our general membership meeting was a full house and we had some great speakers discussing the new proposal ballot issue to build a new arena in Oklahoma City. Drew Dugan with the Greater OKC Chamber of Commerce and Tyler Moore Campaign Consultant shared the vision of the arena gave an exceelent presentation. The Board of Directors voted unanimously to support the ballot issue on December 12^th in Oklahoma City. There is a strong coalition of business and community leaders Keep OKC Big League | Coalition and for more information on the election click here - Home | Keep OKC Big League. 

Special Thank You to AOGC-Bobby Stem for allowing us to use their space for our meeting!!

ACEC OK, AOGC and OKAA hosted a fundraiser with Senator Haste. We had great attendance and want to give a special Thank You to everyone who participated.

The legislative session begins on Monday, February 5^th and according to Treasurer Russ revenue continues to decline “Revenues from all sources in October totaled $1.4 billion, a decrease of $73.8 million or 5.0 percent compared to the same month one year ago.” https://quorumcall.online/email/email_01ZP_6RL1AQVRD.htm The Board of Equalization meets in December to examine what certified funds will be available to the legislature for FY 2024-2025.

Further below in the newsletter is information to sign up for the PSMJ Principals Bootcamp---a Special Thank You to Poe & Associates for providing the space for the Bootcamp!! Please see below and sign up soon for the early bird rate.

Special Elections

Comanche County voters selected their party nominees to face off in a special election to fill Lawton's Senate District 32 seat. Republican Dusty Deevers and Democrat Larry Bush won their respective primary elections. The state does not conduct runoff primaries in special elections. The Senate District 32 general election will occur on Dec. 12, the same day as a special primary election for the House District 39 seat in Edmond. SD32 includes a large portion of Lawton, including Fort Sill and Cameron University. Republicans have an advantage in the district. As of January, the district included 16,414 registered Republicans, 12,997 registered Democrats and 9,150 independents, according to State Election Board data.

Seven Republicans, two Democrats and one Libertarian are candidates in the special primary election for House District 39, vacated by Ryan Martinez, which will be held on December 12th. The general election is scheduled for February 13th.

Republican candidates – Kristen Ferate, 45; William A. Gaige Jr., 47; Tim Hale, 64; Erick Harris, 36; Ronda Lee Peterson, 61; Cris Price, 53; Ross Vanhooser, 63.

Democrat candidates – Regan Raff, 43, Paul Timmons, 62.

Senate Changes Budget Process:

The Process: Wednesdays are officially appropriations days. They have cleared the floor completely for appropriations work and don’t anticipate being on the floor on Wednesdays.

Subcommittees have been empowered, especially with agency budgets. Starting week 1, multiple subappropriations committees will be coming to appropriations with recommendations.

They will be dealing with budget and policy bills at the same time. Weeks 3-4 will be very full appropriations committees. Major change is that appropriations work will begin week 1, and the fiscal impact statement of bills will be more important than ever, and more important earlier in session.

Session begins Monday, February 5th and ends May 31st.

The R&D Amortization Update

There have been almost 1,300 emails sent to Capitol Hill since we relaunched our action alert, but not nearly enough. We need more ACEC members to reach out to their House and Senate members to stress the urgency of action now.

ACEC's very own, Dave Bender, was named the National Institute of Lobbying Ethics (NILE) announced that ACEC’s Dave Bender was named one of just two Top PAC Professionals of the Year. This award recognizes excellence in the field while ensuring the selection process is purely merit-based. The dedicated panel of NILE judges blindly evaluated each nominee to guarantee that the honor of being a Top Lobbyist or PAC Professional was earned solely through outstanding performance and dedication to their profession.

Thank you for your generous support of our pac. We are about to enter an election year and your contribution will be critical in electing legislators supportive of our agenda.

Back by popular demand, PSMJ is offering an Oklahoma City Bootcamp Feb 7-8. A flyer is attached with information related to the bootcamp here.

What: PSMJ Principals Bootcamp

Where: 1601 NW Expressway, OKC OK 73118