The Tulsa World buried my campaign’ press released story about Dewey Bartlett's enthusiastic vote, while a member of the Airport Board, for Kathy Taylor's $7.1 million giveaway of Tulsan's property taxes to Bank of Oklahoma.
The settlement, voted on in a "Emergency Meeting" on June 26, 2008, was payment of the principal in full for the debt the Airport Board owed to Tulsa Industrial Authority, which in turn owed the money to BOk. The City of Tulsa was in no way a party to that lawsuit, but the mayor chose to make Tulsa a defendant so that she could legally dip into Tulsa's sinking fund, which is paid for by city property taxes.
The World hates to report on anything regarding Great Plains Airlines, so they buried the story. But hey, at least they covered it! We have been unable to find any record that the World reported on the emergency meeting, or Bartlett's vote. Here is the full text from Sunday's story:
Medlock questions Bartlett: Republican mayoral candidate Chris Medlock is questioning why fellow GOP mayoral opponent Dewey Bartlett Jr., as a Tulsa Airports Improvement Trust member, voted for Mayor Kathy Taylor's $7.1 million lawsuit settlement regarding Great Plains Airlines.
"Dewey Bartlett is claiming to be a conservative Republican," Medlock said in a pres
s release, "but he supported a Democrat mayor in one of the single biggest giveaways of taxpayer money in this city's history. Bartlett needs to explain his wasteful actions to the voters.
"This was $7.1 million of city property taxes that Tulsa didn't owe," Medlock said, "but which Kathy Taylor paid in full, to the Bank of Oklahoma."
Taylor, whom Bartlett endorsed, appointed him to TAIT. He just resigned from the board to run for mayor.
Bartlett called Medlock's press release "political rhetoric" and declined to comment further.
Let’s see if we have this straight. Dewey Bartlett is saying that a Republican opponent asking why he joined a Democrat mayor is giving away millions of taxpayer dollars is “political rhetoric?" How interesting.
He isn’t denying that he voted for the proposal as we havevideo of him doing just that on YouTube. He isn’t denying that he praised the mayor for her actions, because the video tape clearly shows he did!
So rather than just answering the question and addressing why he did it, he chose to listen to his campaign handlers and came back with the classic “non-responsive response.”
Dewey Bartlett (R) was named to the Airport Board by Kathy Taylor (D). Kathy Taylor thennames former airport Marketing Director Mary Smith (R) to the Airport Board to replace Carl Clay (R) who was an outspoken critic of the Great Plains/BOk settlement. Mary Smith was part of the team that sold Great Plains Airlines to the public, when they went after and secured $30 million in state tax credits. Mary Smith is now Bartlett's Campaign Treasurer!
Please understand, that what Dewey did was to help the current Democrat mayor (Kathy Taylor) brush under the table the single biggest scandal of the previous Democrat mayor (Susan Savage). The Bartlett campaign team made up two-fifths of the vote that needlessly gave away our property taxes to the tune of $28 for every man, woman and child in the city, and he won't even respond to the Tulsa World, who will do everything to put his response in the most positive of lights? Don't you think it's time for KRMG and KFAQ to invite Bartlett back on the air to respond to this action in this giveaway, as well as his support of Kathy Taylor's re-election before the Republicans had selected a candidate?
Don’t we expect more candor from someone who wants to be our next mayor? If he won't answer for his actions as a mayoral appointee, how can we trust that he'll answer for his actions as our mayor?
1 comment:
...how can we trust that he'll answer for his actions as our mayor?
He won't. He'll do just as the other members of his elitist little would-be oligarchy have always done.
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