For many, MAPS is causing a decrease in quality of life

[Ed Shadid]

As we prepare for a MAPS4 vote this December it is important to consider that while the MAPS programs have brought many positive changes to the city, they do not occur in a vacuum; our commitment to these capital projects programs results in a decrease in the amount of services the city can provide to its residents. While city operations and maintenance of our collective assets is never as fun to observe as a ribbon cutting for a shiny new project, they are crucial to our quality of life.

While certain MAPS projects have increased the quality of life of OKC residents (most significantly trails, sidewalks and senior wellness centers IMO), what if those benefits came at a cost of not being able to provide adequate city services? What if part of the reason that we have been such an outlier over the last decade in terms of failing to provide Sunday and evening public transit, inadequate street and park maintenance, and operating with insufficient numbers of public safety personnel was that the City was starving its Departments in order to accommodate placing almost 50% of the sales tax we allocate to all Departments in our General Fund towards the MAPS programs.

Particularly during the last ten years (the MAPS3 era), the City has kept the sales tax rate to fund city services artificially low (compared to other cities in OK) in order to accommodate a one-cent MAPS tax. City government is the branch of government that affects our day-to-day lives the most and by starving city departments (such as parks and recreation, public transit, public works, planning, development and police/fire), or bringing capital projects online which require operations costs to be diverted from other city services because no source of operations funding was planned at the time of passage, the MAPS program indirectly diminishes our quality of life.


Oklahoma City is an outlier among large cities in the U.S. in terms of its reliance on sales tax to fund City operations; anything that decreases OKC sales tax will have an outsized influence on the amount of city services delivered and our quality of life.


Oklahoma is the only state in the U.S. that does not allow municipalities to fund operations with property tax. This is the principle reason that sales tax plays such an outsized role in funding city services.


The capital and operations budgets of most of the City's departments are funded through the General Fund and sales tax is, by far, the largest revenue source for the General Fund.

The sales tax rate in Oklahoma City is 8.625% (with 4.5% going to the State and 4.125% going to the City (there is also a county tax for those who live in Cleveland and Canadian County) which was raised in January 2019 from 3.875% due to a 0.25% increase approved by voters in 2018. Oklahoma City divides that 4.125% as follows:

Initiative Petitions in previous decades created a dedicated funding source for the Zoo of 1/8 cent and for police/fire of ¾ cent, which cannot be altered except through an additional vote of the people. Think about that for a moment; the City of OKC has a dedicated funding source for the zoo, but not for public transit or parks. The Council approved a resolution that a ¼ cent increase in the sales tax going towards the General Fund starting in January 2019 would essentially all be spent on police/fire. While that helped increase police and fire staffing levels, it did nothing to help alleviate inadequate funding of Departments outside of Public Safety.


Roughly 2/3s of the General Fund is spent on public safety and since one full cent is dedicated to public safety (the ¾ cent tax passed by initiative petition which is split evenly between police and fire, and the recently passed ¼ cent addition) decreases in sales tax (such as the two year decline in sales tax in fiscal year ’16 and ’17) will be felt disproportionately by the other City Departments; this means layoffs, decreased services and self-defeating policies such as travel bans.

When one compares the sales tax rate for Oklahoma City to other cities in Oklahoma, and subtracts the one-cent dedicated to capital projects in the MAPS program, it becomes clear that OKC has a sales tax rate much lower than other cities:


OKC 3.125% (MAPS tax removed; this was 2.875% until January 2019)

Edmond 3.75%

Lawton 4.5%

Moore 4.0%

McAlester 5.25%

Norman 4.25%

Tulsa 4.017%

Yukon 4.35%


In March 2019 the sales tax for general fund was $19.39 million and the sales tax allocated to the MAPS tax (“Better Streets/Safer City”) was $8.63 million. In other words, approximately 55% of the sales tax that the City collects is dedicated to the General Fund and 24% is dedicated to the MAPS capital projects (2.25/4.125=54.5% and 1/4.125=24.2%).


The ¼ cent increase in the sales tax, which began on 1 January 2019 and which the council has dedicated to public safety is estimated to generate $28 million/year.


So, going forward, if the MAPS program was decreased by ¼ cent and that ¼ cent was redirected towards City services other than police/fire, which has already been addressed by the voters, one would see game-changing alterations in the services the City provides to its residents.


For years, including throughout essentially the entirety of the MAPS programs, OKC was the largest city in the U.S. without Sunday or evening bus service. It is unfathomable that a city of our size would deprive its people of public transit on Sundays and evenings and only provide service once an hour on Saturdays. In a City deemed by Prevention Magazine to be the worst in the entire country for pedestrians, with absolute minimal infrastructure for bicyclists and suffering the highest bicyclist fatality rate in the U.S., along with a 620 sq mile sprawling autocentric city design, the lack of Sunday/evening bus service deserves the strongest rebuke. Given that some $3 million/year made Sunday and evening bus service possible, it is easy to see how making the MAPS program 25-50% smaller would have a massive impact on the daily lives of people throughout the city.


During the MAPS3 years, particularly FY ’16 and ’17 where the city saw the first consecutive two year decline in sales tax revenue in 30 years, employee layoffs, travel bans and cuts in services were all implemented which would have not been necessary but for the largesse of the MAPS program.


Keep in mind that each and every MAPS project, which is capital in nature, could be placed on a General Obligation Bond and paid for with our property tax. This is how we build many things and how we funded large capital projects almost exclusively prior to the MAPS programs. In other words, decreasing the size of the MAPS programs does not mean that we are not ultimately able to complete those capital projects.


According to the 2013 Parks Master Plan, Oklahoma City only spends 28% of what a typical city spends on parks maintenance ($1421 per acre per year compared to an average of $5,000 at the time of the report. Citizens expressed a C minus-rated level of satisfaction (71%) with parks maintenance and D minus-rated level of satisfaction (60%) with walking and biking trails and paths (these satisfaction figures are sourced from the 2016 Citizen Satisfaction Survey, page iii).

Again, with a total annual budget of $26 million, relatively small decreases in the size of the MAPS program would lead to substantial increases in the level of service the City could provide its people through the parks department. Most city parks do not have restroom facilities or adequate trash facilities and these are among the most egregious examples of MAPS causing inadequate spending on our facilities.

Finally, it is important to remember that no funding source for the operations of the MAPS3 projects was identified at the time of its passage a decade ago. While partners were secured for Senior Wellness Centers, there was no mechanism identified to pay the annual $3 million operations budget of the streetcar, nor of the $3-4 million it will take to operate the new downtown Scissortail Park, nor the operations of the Convention Center etc.… Absent a funding source for the operations of these MAPS projects which continue to come online, money is simply diverted away from existing services as there is no increase in the size of City Department budgets.


After years discussing and trying to design a MAPS for Neighborhoods, my conclusion is that the best MAPS for Neighborhoods program is to end MAPS or significantly decrease its size and equilibrate our sales tax rate with other cities in Oklahoma. Decreasing the size of a MAPS4 program and redirecting those savings into departments such as Public Works, Planning, Parks and Recreation, Development and Public Transit is the most effective path towards obtaining the greatest increase in the quality of life for the greatest number of people throughout the entirety of the city.

[thunderbird]

Bruh, your title is grossly misleading.

[TheSteveHunt]

Bruh, your title is grossly misleading.

Ed prefers "skilldawg" not "bruh"

[dcsooner]

As we prepare for a MAPS4 vote this December it is important to consider that while the MAPS programs have brought many positive changes to the city, they do not occur in a vacuum; our commitment to these capital projects programs results in a decrease in the amount of services the city can provide to its residents. While city operations and maintenance of our collective assets is never as fun to observe as a ribbon cutting for a shiny new project, they are crucial to our quality of life.

While certain MAPS projects have increased the quality of life of OKC residents (most significantly trails, sidewalks and senior wellness centers IMO), what if those benefits came at a cost of not being able to provide adequate city services? What if part of the reason that we have been such an outlier over the last decade in terms of failing to provide Sunday and evening public transit, inadequate street and park maintenance, and operating with insufficient numbers of public safety personnel was that the City was starving its Departments in order to accommodate placing almost 50% of the sales tax we allocate to all Departments in our General Fund towards the MAPS programs.

Particularly during the last ten years (the MAPS3 era), the City has kept the sales tax rate to fund city services artificially low (compared to other cities in OK) in order to accommodate a one-cent MAPS tax. City government is the branch of government that affects our day-to-day lives the most and by starving city departments (such as parks and recreation, public transit, public works, planning, development and police/fire), or bringing capital projects online which require operations costs to be diverted from other city services because no source of operations funding was planned at the time of passage, the MAPS program indirectly diminishes our quality of life.


Oklahoma City is an outlier among large cities in the U.S. in terms of its reliance on sales tax to fund City operations; anything that decreases OKC sales tax will have an outsized influence on the amount of city services delivered and our quality of life.


Oklahoma is the only state in the U.S. that does not allow municipalities to fund operations with property tax. This is the principle reason that sales tax plays such an outsized role in funding city services.


The capital and operations budgets of most of the City's departments are funded through the General Fund and sales tax is, by far, the largest revenue source for the General Fund.

The sales tax rate in Oklahoma City is 8.625% (with 4.5% going to the State and 4.125% going to the City (there is also a county tax for those who live in Cleveland and Canadian County) which was raised in January 2019 from 3.875% due to a 0.25% increase approved by voters in 2018. Oklahoma City divides that 4.125% as follows:

Initiative Petitions in previous decades created a dedicated funding source for the Zoo of 1/8 cent and for police/fire of ¾ cent, which cannot be altered except through an additional vote of the people. Think about that for a moment; the City of OKC has a dedicated funding source for the zoo, but not for public transit or parks. The Council approved a resolution that a ¼ cent increase in the sales tax going towards the General Fund starting in January 2019 would essentially all be spent on police/fire. While that helped increase police and fire staffing levels, it did nothing to help alleviate inadequate funding of Departments outside of Public Safety.


Roughly 2/3s of the General Fund is spent on public safety and since one full cent is dedicated to public safety (the ¾ cent tax passed by initiative petition which is split evenly between police and fire, and the recently passed ¼ cent addition) decreases in sales tax (such as the two year decline in sales tax in fiscal year ’16 and ’17) will be felt disproportionately by the other City Departments; this means layoffs, decreased services and self-defeating policies such as travel bans.

When one compares the sales tax rate for Oklahoma City to other cities in Oklahoma, and subtracts the one-cent dedicated to capital projects in the MAPS program, it becomes clear that OKC has a sales tax rate much lower than other cities:


OKC 3.125% (MAPS tax removed; this was 2.875% until January 2019)

Edmond 3.75%

Lawton 4.5%

Moore 4.0%

McAlester 5.25%

Norman 4.25%

Tulsa 4.017%

Yukon 4.35%


In March 2019 the sales tax for general fund was $19.39 million and the sales tax allocated to the MAPS tax (“Better Streets/Safer City”) was $8.63 million. In other words, approximately 55% of the sales tax that the City collects is dedicated to the General Fund and 24% is dedicated to the MAPS capital projects (2.25/4.125=54.5% and 1/4.125=24.2%).


The ¼ cent increase in the sales tax, which began on 1 January 2019 and which the council has dedicated to public safety is estimated to generate $28 million/year.


So, going forward, if the MAPS program was decreased by ¼ cent and that ¼ cent was redirected towards City services other than police/fire, which has already been addressed by the voters, one would see game-changing alterations in the services the City provides to its residents.


For years, including throughout essentially the entirety of the MAPS programs, OKC was the largest city in the U.S. without Sunday or evening bus service. It is unfathomable that a city of our size would deprive its people of public transit on Sundays and evenings and only provide service once an hour on Saturdays. In a City deemed by Prevention Magazine to be the worst in the entire country for pedestrians, with absolute minimal infrastructure for bicyclists and suffering the highest bicyclist fatality rate in the U.S., along with a 620 sq mile sprawling autocentric city design, the lack of Sunday/evening bus service deserves the strongest rebuke. Given that some $3 million/year made Sunday and evening bus service possible, it is easy to see how making the MAPS program 25-50% smaller would have a massive impact on the daily lives of people throughout the city.


During the MAPS3 years, particularly FY ’16 and ’17 where the city saw the first consecutive two year decline in sales tax revenue in 30 years, employee layoffs, travel bans and cuts in services were all implemented which would have not been necessary but for the largesse of the MAPS program.


Keep in mind that each and every MAPS project, which is capital in nature, could be placed on a General Obligation Bond and paid for with our property tax. This is how we build many things and how we funded large capital projects almost exclusively prior to the MAPS programs. In other words, decreasing the size of the MAPS programs does not mean that we are not ultimately able to complete those capital projects.


According to the 2013 Parks Master Plan, Oklahoma City only spends 28% of what a typical city spends on parks maintenance ($1421 per acre per year compared to an average of $5,000 at the time of the report. Citizens expressed a C minus-rated level of satisfaction (71%) with parks maintenance and D minus-rated level of satisfaction (60%) with walking and biking trails and paths (these satisfaction figures are sourced from the 2016 Citizen Satisfaction Survey, page iii).

Again, with a total annual budget of $26 million, relatively small decreases in the size of the MAPS program would lead to substantial increases in the level of service the City could provide its people through the parks department. Most city parks do not have restroom facilities or adequate trash facilities and these are among the most egregious examples of MAPS causing inadequate spending on our facilities.

Finally, it is important to remember that no funding source for the operations of the MAPS3 projects was identified at the time of its passage a decade ago. While partners were secured for Senior Wellness Centers, there was no mechanism identified to pay the annual $3 million operations budget of the streetcar, nor of the $3-4 million it will take to operate the new downtown Scissortail Park, nor the operations of the Convention Center etc.… Absent a funding source for the operations of these MAPS projects which continue to come online, money is simply diverted away from existing services as there is no increase in the size of City Department budgets.


After years discussing and trying to design a MAPS for Neighborhoods, my conclusion is that the best MAPS for Neighborhoods program is to end MAPS or significantly decrease its size and equilibrate our sales tax rate with other cities in Oklahoma. Decreasing the size of a MAPS4 program and redirecting those savings into departments such as Public Works, Planning, Parks and Recreation, Development and Public Transit is the most effective path towards obtaining the greatest increase in the quality of life for the greatest number of people throughout the entirety of the city.

IMO, He makes a cogent argument for several things, funding City departments via property tax, reduction in Maps project fund allocation and increasing sales tax rate to match other Oklahoma cites. I don't have a vote, but if I did I could (absent any counter facts) embrace his proposals.


This is troubling, if true


While partners were secured for Senior Wellness Centers, there was no mechanism identified to pay the annual $3 million operations budget of the streetcar, nor of the $3-4 million it will take to operate the new downtown Scissortail Park, nor the operations of the Convention Center etc.

[OKC Guy]

Ed,

Great post and I agree. I was recently harping on why we just approved $2,500,000 on more streetcar parts when we got parts as part of our $140,000,000 initial buy. And we have a warranty. I was chastised here for even questioning it.

My point matches yours in that the MAPS bills are all going to come due. The cost of not only upkeep (which you covered) but the upgrades is going to bust our bank. The first MAPS were built in the 90’s and there will be higher cost needs in future, just to keep on standards.

Then the streetcar. To me that was/is the biggest waste of money. Its a money pit and yet people want to expand it. In 5 years the existing SC will have upgrade/upkeep costs that will not be cheap let alone expand it. How great would our bus system be had we put $140,000,000 in it instead. We could have bus hubs all around the metro. Then could have bought luxury mini vans or buses to run around downtown every 5 minutes plus ability to adjust routes based on future growth changes. We are too large to expand SC and can not afford to do SC expansions.

Then you have the regional transit pipedream. They will want and need a tax to pay for it. So how high can we keep increasing our taxes? And the kicker is we are in the longest economic expansion in our lives. But in due time maybe 2-5 years our economy will take a break. As taxes go down and costs go up we are gonna be a broke city with everyone wondering what happened.

We simply cannot afford all these “dreams” that a smaller segment of our metro is trying to force feed the rest of city.

The wellness centers are one of the great stories but there are not enough projects like that. Our roads are pathetic. Still bad bus service. Even the city pothole patrol is now taking months when it used to take a few days. Likely budget cuts to feed MAPS. I had to get a city Dept Director involved to fix a bad pothole after trying for over 3 months on OKC Connect and calling to no avail. And again I placed a tree limb obstruction OKC Connect ticket and had to call after 2 months. This one obscured the flashing school zone sign! What if a kid got hit because a driver wasn’t aware? My point os our city services have gone to crap yet now we are trying to invent new things to spend money on or expand a money pit SC system which is mainly a great bar hopping service (hey, it had highest ise for St Pats day).

I do know I am ready to vote my councilman out at next election unless he starts fighting for the forgotten 80% rest of OKC. MAPS has helped our city grow but it has now outgrown its use. We need to only pass projects by a vote of the people and only 1 project per vote. So if they want 5 projects thats separate votes.

You are not alone in your thinking. We need to start respecting the other parts of our infrastructure including bus and roads. A majority of metro still needs roads to do most anything.

[mugofbeer]

Agreed that good points are brought up but the problem isn't MAPS, it's the silly property tax rules that are the ultimate basis for city and state revenue problems.

Short but sweet, the title of this thread is just outright stupid. I've lived outside OKC for 30 years but still visit almost monthly. Maybe people who live in OKC daily don't see it but OKC has completely transformed since MAPS started. OKC now has good things and having good things cost money. I'm not sure if Mr. Shadid just doesn't like having good things or if some of you are just of the mindset that if "l don't use it so l don't want to pay for it." Lots of other people use those things you all think is a waste. Those things also give OKC an image that was rock-bottom but is now far better. There have been multiple billions invested in the city. The city center is being rebuilt. Are there things outside downtown that need to be done? Sure, but you have to start somewhere. I believe the citizens voted hundreds of millions for street repairs and improvements. There has been a MAPS for kids and there are senior centers being built so the outer ares are not completely ignored.
To improve the other areas, you have to make it more desirable to live inward, which is starting. The city also needs to do a much better job of attracting outside Angel investing for redevelopment. The city should make it a bit more difficult for outward expansion.
As the old saying goes, lead, follow or get out of the way. Just don't be an obstructionist whiner and if you are outvoted, live with it. If it's just too much to handle? Leave.

[OKC Guy]

Agreed that good points are brought up but the problem isn't MAPS, it's the silly property tax rules that are the ultimate basis for city and state revenue problems.

Short but sweet, the title of this thread is just outright stupid. I've lived outside OKC for 30 years but still visit almost monthly. Maybe people who live in OKC daily don't see it but OKC has completely transformed since MAPS started. OKC now has good things and having good things cost money. I'm not sure if Mr. Shadid just doesn't like having good things or if some of you are just of the mindset that if "l don't use it so l don't want to pay for it." Lots of other people use those things you all think is a waste. Those things also give OKC an image that was rock-bottom but is now far better. There have been multiple billions invested in the city. The city center is being rebuilt. Are there things outside downtown that need to be done? Sure, but you have to start somewhere. I believe the citizens voted hundreds of millions for street repairs and improvements. There has been a MAPS for kids and there are senior centers being built so the outer ares are not completely ignored.
To improve the other areas, you have to make it more desirable to live inward, which is starting. The city also needs to do a much better job of attracting outside Angel investing for redevelopment. The city should make it a bit more difficult for outward expansion.
As the old saying goes, lead, follow or get out of the way. Just don't be an obstructionist whiner and if you are outvoted, live with it. If it's just too much to handle? Leave.

I agree with the first part but my contention is we did improve our core by a thousand times from the late 80’s. But we are at a crossroads and have to take a break from bundle projects. Its ok to still want projects but we need to slow our roll and be more selective in them. What we need now is a MAPS for the rest of the city. The first 2 letters of MAPS stands for Metropolitan Area. That does not mean solely downtown.

Some keep forgetting we are a spread out city so saying build from the inside out makes no sense. We already built outward and those fine folks are just as intregral as the downtowners. We need to embrace what we are not what some want us to be. The rest of the city has been neglected and we need to now find a balance. Its like you are saying move downtown or else you don’t matter and your voice is moot. Instead of saying build inside out I say lets take care of all of OKC instead of a select group downtown.

After almost 30 years of focusing on downtown we have not only caught up we have surpassed other same sized cities imo. The park and convention and OMNI will add even more value once opened. But then we need to pause on bundles and figure out what projects we need and put less of them to individual votes. And start spending on core items and services. Plus figuring out how to pay for upkeep and upgrades to what we do have downtown.

To be honest there is more population and business growth away from downtown too and those folks are gonna want to live close enough to their work. An example is Paycom in far NE OKC. Its creating mega growth in housing and shopping and other things. Yet the roads near by have not been touched to speak of and it needs to be addressed. But since all the extra monies are drained for MAPS type projects none is left. At some point us not spending to take care of these other areas will stagnate travel and growth ability and the 80% of non downtowners standard of living. They matter too. Unless we build another massive Devin downtown most of the growth downtown is tourists.

We need to regroup because even one more big bundled MAPS could be the tipping point where we will have to massively raise taxes to pay for past MAPS, new MAPS, RTA initiatives and then all the neglected infrastructure of 600 square miles of city plus services.

MAPS has done wonders and did make us a great city. Now its time to regroup and go forward smartly.

[mugofbeer]

I agree with the first part but my contention is we did improve our core by a thousand times from the late 80’s. But we are at a crossroads and have to take a break from bundle projects. Its ok to still want projects but we need to slow our roll and be more selective in them. What we need now is a MAPS for the rest of the city. The first 2 letters of MAPS stands for Metropolitan Area. That does not mean solely downtown.

Some keep forgetting we are a spread out city so saying build from the inside out makes no sense. We already built outward and those fine folks are just as intregral as the downtowners. We need to embrace what we are not what some want us to be. The rest of the city has been neglected and we need to now find a balance. Its like you are saying move downtown or else you don’t matter and your voice is moot. Instead of saying build inside out I say lets take care of all of OKC instead of a select group downtown.

First, I think it is important to specify what parts of town you are speaking of and exactly what is it you want to accomplish. If you live on the outer fringes of OKC, chances are your home, your school and your shopping is better, newer and more convenient than in central OKC. Therefore, your part of the city doesn't need as much.

I will agree that the parts of town built, say from the 50s up to 1980-ish need sprucing up. But exactly what is it you want to do? New sidewalks? OK. Streets? It's already underway. New parks, possibly but it seems there are a lot of them and exactly who is going to use them? Schools? OK. What is it you want to accomplish. Who is it to benefit and how? Personally, as a roughly monthly visitor to town, I would just like to see the city keep the damn streetlights lit. I understand there are problems around. Lyrewood Lane is becoming a dangerous place but is that OKC or Warr Acres? Either way, how can MAPS help?

After almost 30 years of focusing on downtown we have not only caught up we have surpassed other same sized cities imo. The park and convention and OMNI will add even more value once opened. But then we need to pause on bundles and figure out what projects we need and put less of them to individual votes. And start spending on core items and services. Plus figuring out how to pay for upkeep and upgrades to what we do have downtown.

To be honest there is more population and business growth away from downtown too and those folks are gonna want to live close enough to their work. An example is Paycom in far NE OKC. Its creating mega growth in housing and shopping and other things. Yet the roads near by have not been touched to speak of and it needs to be addressed. But since all the extra monies are drained for MAPS type projects none is left. At some point us not spending to take care of these other areas will stagnate travel and growth ability and the 80% of non downtowners standard of living. They matter too. Unless we build another massive Devin downtown most of the growth downtown is tourists.

Yes, growth is happening outside of downtown, I think we have established that. My point is, by improving roads at a whim on the outer fringe, you are encouraging growth further and further out. OKC now extends far beyond the Kilpatrick to the north. OKC needs to be encouraged to look inward for rebuilds, renovations and infill. Look at the city from an aerial photo and you will see all sorts of unused, vacant or underused land. Again, there was a bond issue for nearly half a billion dollars approved so that issue shouldn't be a problem. Taking care of maintenance is the main problem I see and that is the city manager's job. If he/she can't handle it, OKC needs to find a new one who can.

[OKC Guy]

First, I think it is important to specify what parts of town you are speaking of and exactly what is it you want to accomplish. If you live on the outer fringes of OKC, chances are your home, your school and your shopping is better, newer and more convenient than in central OKC. Therefore, your part of the city doesn't need as much.

I will agree that the parts of town built, say from the 50s up to 1980-ish need sprucing up. But exactly what is it you want to do? New sidewalks? OK. Streets? It's already underway. New parks, possibly but it seems there are a lot of them and exactly who is going to use them? Schools? OK. What is it you want to accomplish. Who is it to benefit and how? Personally, as a roughly monthly visitor to town, I would just like to see the city keep the damn streetlights lit. I understand there are problems around. Lyrewood Lane is becoming a dangerous place but is that OKC or Warr Acres? Either way, how can MAPS help?



Yes, growth is happening outside of downtown, I think we have established that. My point is, by improving roads at a whim on the outer fringe, you are encouraging growth further and further out. OKC now extends far beyond the Kilpatrick to the north. OKC needs to be encouraged to look inward for rebuilds, renovations and infill. Look at the city from an aerial photo and you will see all sorts of unused, vacant or underused land. Again, there was a bond issue for nearly half a billion dollars approved so that issue shouldn't be a problem. Taking care of maintenance is the main problem I see and that is the city manager's job. If he/she can't handle it, OKC needs to find a new one who can.

On the outer roads, thats where business is moving to. So why wouldn’t we want to improve them? These businesses dont want to be downtown in fact some rely on ability to get trucks in and out easily. Thats actually one of our selling points to a business locked in a high traffic city like Dallas, where its now harder to move goods around and out/in of/to city. If we keep neglecting outer parts of city the roads will not handle business growth.

Roads need improved all over city. Street Lighting needs fixed and stay fixed. Potholes and other core services needs better funding. Bus service needs fixed to serve the entire city

I am not against downtown projects. My take is all the prior MAPS improved our city by leaps and bounds and we are no longer behind others and are ahead of some. Our projects are paid for. What I am saying is we have to slow down and be more selective in what we build. Instead of 6 projects lets do 2, and each of the 2 has its own vote. So maybe soccer stadium and aquarium are all we try. Or pick any 2.

As for your claim schools are bad in the inner core then why didn’t we address it instead of all the MAPS projects? Are priorities misguided in the past? Plus we did have MAPS for Schools already.

I am not advocating for major projects in outer city either but due to size of city we need to put money in the til to support areas away from downtown. Its sad we spent so mich on streetcar and not on buses.

We are a road dependent city and nothing will change that anytime soon. We could have helped at least make an effort by making our bus service work. Imagine if we spent half of the $140,000,000 that SC cost into bus system. $70,000,000 would have made us one of the best bus cities of this land size in the country. And instead of driving downtown you have bus hubs with gated parking and can reduce the cars needing to drive downtown. And charm with buses you can change routes to meet changing needs. SC is locked into a set route and still requires people to drive downtown. Thats an example of what we could have done.

Roads are not evil as a form of transportation and we need to embrace our city is spread out. Not all want to live in downtown lots want to enjoy the breadth of our city. Same with business. Paycom is close to 3,000 workers and thats a huge economic impact. Yet we are not takikg care of the basic road needs. And this is anywhere we have business expanding all over the city.

Our core services have gone downhill. All I’m saying is we need to pause and figure out the citywide priorities in spending. Just the basics like road paint is in bad condition. Potholes. And many other needs. OKC Connect used to be the best system in country to report problems and get fast fixes. Now its not because I suspect its underfunded.

I am not against projects in downtown but think MAPS has done its job greatly and its now time stop MAPS and be selective with new projects. Then we can refund core and other pressing needs all over the city.

It does not have to one or the other like you seem to indicate. It can be both done smartly going forward. An example of bad - If we build a SC extension we are goimg to eat up major future cost needs just for upkeep and upgrade of this money pit. Its going to take away from more pressing needs as it does not serve much of metro. If we don’t think about future costs of existing projects we will fail in upkeeping them too, or have to spend a bulk of money just to maintain or upgrade them. In 10 years just the daily operating costs of SC will be well over$10,000,000. Then the street cars themselves will need replaced at a point I imagine those are not cheap and we have 7 of them.

[Laramie]

On the outer roads, thats where business is moving to. So why wouldn’t we want to improve them? These businesses dont want to be downtown in fact some rely on ability to get trucks in and out easily. Thats actually one of our selling points to a business locked in a high traffic city like Dallas, where its now harder to move goods around and out/in of/to city. If we keep neglecting outer parts of city the roads will not handle business growth.

Roads need improved all over city. Street Lighting needs fixed and stay fixed. Potholes and other core services needs better funding. Bus service needs fixed to serve the entire city

I am not against downtown projects. My take is all the prior MAPS improved our city by leaps and bounds and we are no longer behind others and are ahead of some. Our projects are paid for. What I am saying is we have to slow down and be more selective in what we build. Instead of 6 projects lets do 2, and each of the 2 has its own vote. So maybe soccer stadium and aquarium are all we try. Or pick any 2.

As for your claim schools are bad in the inner core then why didn’t we address it instead of all the MAPS projects? Are priorities misguided in the past? Plus we did have MAPS for Schools already.

I am not advocating for major projects in outer city either but due to size of city we need to put money in the til to support areas away from downtown. Its sad we spent so mich on streetcar and not on buses.

We are a road dependent city and nothing will change that anytime soon. We could have helped at least make an effort by making our bus service work. Imagine if we spent half of the $140,000,000 that SC cost into bus system. $70,000,000 would have made us one of the best bus cities of this land size in the country. And instead of driving downtown you have bus hubs with gated parking and can reduce the cars needing to drive downtown. And charm with buses you can change routes to meet changing needs. SC is locked into a set route and still requires people to drive downtown. Thats an example of what we could have done.

Roads are not evil as a form of transportation and we need to embrace our city is spread out. Not all want to live in downtown lots want to enjoy the breadth of our city. Same with business. Paycom is close to 3,000 workers and thats a huge economic impact. Yet we are not takikg care of the basic road needs. And this is anywhere we have business expanding all over the city.

Our core services have gone downhill. All I’m saying is we need to pause and figure out the citywide priorities in spending. Just the basics like road paint is in bad condition. Potholes. And many other needs. OKC Connect used to be the best system in country to report problems and get fast fixes. Now its not because I suspect its underfunded.

I am not against projects in downtown but think MAPS has done its job greatly and its now time stop MAPS and be selective with new projects. Then we can refund core and other pressing needs all over the city.

It does not have to one or the other like you seem to indicate. It can be both done smartly going forward. An example of bad - If we build a SC extension we are goimg to eat up major future cost needs just for upkeep and upgrade of this money pit. Its going to take away from more pressing needs as it does not serve much of metro. If we don’t think about future costs of existing projects we will fail in upkeeping them too, or have to spend a bulk of money just to maintain or upgrade them. In 10 years just the daily operating costs of SC will be well over$10,000,000. Then the street cars themselves will need replaced at a point I imagine those are not cheap and we have 7 of them.

Your cost analysis research raises a lot of eyebrows with many MAPS projects; especially with posters. Know you are in opposition of the MAPS project' junction.

$10 million daily operating costs, really; would you like to correct that figure... ...this is the type of exaggeration that ruins you credibility.

[Laramie]

It was my understanding MAPS capital improvement money couldn't be used for operational expenses?

Now, if you proposed a sales tax (not MAPS extension) just for operational expenses, Dr. Shadid, I agree with you 100%.

[RaRaRyan]

It does not have to one or the other like you seem to indicate. It can be both done smartly going forward. An example of bad - If we build a SC extension we are goimg to eat up major future cost needs just for upkeep and upgrade of this money pit. Its going to take away from more pressing needs as it does not serve much of metro. If we don’t think about future costs of existing projects we will fail in upkeeping them too, or have to spend a bulk of money just to maintain or upgrade them. In 10 years just the daily operating costs of SC will be well over$10,000,000. Then the street cars themselves will need replaced at a point I imagine those are not cheap and we have 7 of them.

Just admit you phrased that poorly and move on. It reads like the daily operating costs would be $10M. Not the total cost of operation over 10 years. I can easily see where others are getting tripped up in how you phrased that.

[king183]

Agreed that good points are brought up but the problem isn't MAPS, it's the silly property tax rules that are the ultimate basis for city and state revenue problems.

To reiterate what others have already said: this is such a poorly argued piece by Ed. He launches a broadside against MAPS, declaring it has lowered our quality of life, and then proceeds to give a host of legitimate reason that endanger our city that have nothing to do with MAPS. The restriction on using property tax, for instance, would still be detrimental to the city's ability to sustain predictable funding priorities even if MAPS never existed.

Ed often makes good points about lack of transparency in our city government and the "good ol' boys" club that runs parts of this city, but he then overshadows those points with seemingly random, poorly thought-out, overwrought attacks on initiatives proven to increase our quality of life. He certainly has a cut of your nose to spite your face attitude about many things in this city.

[Ed Shadid]

To reiterate what others have already said: this is such a poorly argued piece by Ed. He launches a broadside against MAPS, declaring it has lowered our quality of life, and then proceeds to give a host of legitimate reason that endanger our city that have nothing to do with MAPS. The restriction on using property tax, for instance, would still be detrimental to the city's ability to sustain predictable funding priorities even if MAPS never existed.

Ed often makes good points about lack of transparency in our city government and the "good ol' boys" club that runs parts of this city, but he then overshadows those points with seemingly random, poorly thought-out, overwrought attacks on initiatives proven to increase our quality of life. He certainly has a cut of your nose to spite your face attitude about many things in this city.

Tough crowd. Quite a bit of work and research went into the original post; could be wrong but is well researched with as long of an explanation as anyone would likely read and isn't poorly thought-out or random. Show me where my logic, contentions or research are wrong rather than utilizing one or two sentence blanket statements.

Perhaps I should add another caveat. Whether one has realized an increase in quality of life from MAPS programs (particularly projects such as the very expensive Whitewater amenity which most families in OKC cannot afford, or the Convention Center) and whether one was particularly vulnerable to a decrease in quality of life due to anemic City Department budgets such as parks and public transit at least partially depends on one's socioeconomic status.

In my post I referenced how devastating the last ten years have been for those tens of thousands of people who live in the city but do not own a car and who lived in one of the only large cities in the developed world without public transit on Sundays or evenings with only once an hour service on Saturdays. In my experience, the argument that inadequate city services led to a decrease in quality of life is more readily received and agreed upon by those who were not able to be connected to jobs, or food, or family, or social events, or medical appointments due to a lack of public transit. If you ride public transit you likely have had such conversations; if you don't, ask friends or family that utilize public transit; if you don't have any friends or family that utilize public transit then be open to the possibility that the City acted in a sadistic and extremely harmful manner to those who are transit/bike/pedestrian dependent and the possibility that the reason the Transit budget was so anemic was to accommodate a program of utilizing such a large amount of sales tax for capital projects.

Likewise, those who live in larger homes with backyard amenities, or gated communities with gathering places, might not utilize city parks with the same frequency as those individuals and families without the same amenities at home. They might not notice that there are virtually no restroom facilities in our parks throughout the city other than, maybe, a port a potty that oftentimes can be smelled from a block away. Or that there might just be one trash can for an entire park oftentimes located on the periphery of the park.

As other have pointed out, all municipalities in Oklahoma are subject to the same unique property tax restriction as OKC. Their response has been to incrementally increase their sales tax rate to a level considerably higher than OKC to accomodate the growth in population and size of the area being served. It is my belief that we were unable to follow suit because we had a full cent dedicated to the MAPS tax. Keep in mind that we could have increased the OKC mil rate and sold larger GO Bonds (the OKC mil rate on its property tax is also lower than surrounding municipalities) and built many of the capital projects included in MAPS; but instead we chose to build these capital projects with sales tax rather than property tax. Capital projects can be built with either sales tax or property tax. Operations and maintenance can use sales tax but not property tax. So a City like OKC which chooses to heavily utilize sales tax for capital projects (ie: the MAPS program) is going to be limited in how much they can increase sales tax to pay for operations and maintenance.

Another observation as to socioeconomic class implications of which I admittedly haven't completely sorted out as I need more data : MAPS 3 was passed because of the turnout in Ward 8. Period. MAPS 3 was either virtually tied or lost in every single ward except a slight amount in Ward 2 and a large amount in Ward 8. MAPS3 is a Ward 8 phenomenon as it would have gone down in defeat without the Ward 8 vote. Although I have not seen median income measures by Ward, I would assume that as a whole, Ward 2 and Ward 8 contain large pockets of higher income residents and have a higher median income as a whole than the other wards. Ward 8 also has the highest voter turnout of any Ward. This, in my opinion, is not lost upon pollsters and those who formulate GO BOND and MAPS packages. If you want MAPS4 to pass, it will have to poll well, and have good turnout in Ward 8. Ward 8 will then have a disproportionate say in the final formulation of MAPS4.

[TheSteveHunt]

Can't go much lower than invoking the dreaded "love it or leave it" crap....

Agreed that good points are brought up but the problem isn't MAPS, it's the silly property tax rules that are the ultimate basis for city and state revenue problems.

Short but sweet, the title of this thread is just outright stupid. I've lived outside OKC for 30 years but still visit almost monthly. Maybe people who live in OKC daily don't see it but OKC has completely transformed since MAPS started. OKC now has good things and having good things cost money. I'm not sure if Mr. Shadid just doesn't like having good things or if some of you are just of the mindset that if "l don't use it so l don't want to pay for it." Lots of other people use those things you all think is a waste. Those things also give OKC an image that was rock-bottom but is now far better. There have been multiple billions invested in the city. The city center is being rebuilt. Are there things outside downtown that need to be done? Sure, but you have to start somewhere. I believe the citizens voted hundreds of millions for street repairs and improvements. There has been a MAPS for kids and there are senior centers being built so the outer ares are not completely ignored.
To improve the other areas, you have to make it more desirable to live inward, which is starting. The city also needs to do a much better job of attracting outside Angel investing for redevelopment. The city should make it a bit more difficult for outward expansion.
As the old saying goes, lead, follow or get out of the way. Just don't be an obstructionist whiner and if you are outvoted, live with it. If it's just too much to handle? Leave.

[TheTravellers]

When I worked at Pitney Bowes (as a sys admin for the software developers) a long time ago, they had to start a program called "Fix the Basics", and that's truly what it was. There were all kinds of fancy things happening and nice new shiny things going on, but they had problems with the basics such as old outdated hardware, dead printers, bad infrastructure, non-working lights and water fountains, etc. They really needed to go back and fix the basics and build up again from the bottom and make sure the foundation that supported all the fancy new things was secure. OKC needs the same thing. Our streets are sh*t WRT potholes, lane markings, signage, etc., our social services aren't much better, our public transit sucks (but it's getting better thanks to Ed and a few others), and on and on. We really need to go back and fix the basics before we keep moving on with the big new shiny "Oh, cool" type of things, IMO. Of course, none of the basics are sexy and appealing, so it's an uphill battle. Yeah, we have tons of new cool restaurants, but we also have huge food deserts (read the latest Gazette cover story for that, it's been a problem for decades, especially for the NE side) and lots of hungry people, we also have quite a few homeless that need to be helped, we're #1 in incarcerating women (and probably overall too, haven't researched that to make sure, though), and quite a few of those incarcerations for both men and women are basically for piddly sh*t that they shouldn't be jailed for (although that's changing a bit with the last couple of elections), etc.

[bombermwc]

I would disagree whole heartedly on the points that the programs didn't add quality. I would say they were integral parts of causing the changes that we now are experiencing. Especially the first round was HUGELY impactful in kicking off a change in the city and a change in the perception of OKC to outsiders. We're continuing to see the results of that transformation as other things develop. I would argue that the financial changes from those programs are absolutely in the positive as well.

I would like to see the next phase spend effort outside of downtown. With what we've done so far, i think we've given plenty of momentum to sustain that for quite a while. But i do agree that we need to get sidewalks on all main streets. I'm not personally a fan of bikes being on roads, so you wont get me there. And if you want buses on Sundays, then take that up with Embark. If we dont have the riders to sustain it, then why would they want to lose money on it? I dont want to be subsidizing that either, Either it's a private company and they get to make that call, or take it all back public, but pick one.

And we have that big General Fund pool because we dont have endowments or designated funds to maintain what we have. Not everything can self-support like the 'Peake. The canal doesn't make money, so if we want to keep it running, then we need general funds. The LAST thing i would want to see is funds being designated all over the budget. That just ends up pulling money into pools and it's never where you need it.

[BoulderSooner]

the entire premise of this thread is simply not true

[Bellaboo]

Fix it all with a couple of years of MAPS tax that funds an endowment to support those projects that need support. It doesn't have to be complicated.

[BoulderSooner]

Fix it all with a couple of years of MAPS tax that funds an endowment to support those projects that need support. It doesn't have to be complicated.

OKC has a massive city budget and overall the citizens are very happy with the services they receive ..

this reminds me of when ED ran for Mayor his basic campaign message was vote for me and i will fix our terrible city ..... which didn't work very well when the huge majority thought things were going pretty great ..


this also should very much be in the politics section

[Timshel]

this also should very much be in the politics section

This.

I applaud Ed for raising what are very legitimate concerns regarding the city's issues with funding vital city services. But I find it incredibly dubious to argue there is a causal relationship between the existence of MAPS and this lack of funding and believe its much more likely that if MAPS did not exist the city would still have issues adequately funding these services (because we're Oklahoma and we don't like paying for these things) and we would not have all of the benefits that MAPS have provided over the last 20+ years.

OKC's sales tax including MAPS is still lower than the other large cities in Oklahoma, which seems to suggest that instead of MAPS being the issue, city leadership has made a policy decision (possibly unwisely, I would agree) to have a lower sales tax than our "peer" Oklahoma cities regardless of MAPS. Would seem the solution that could make everyone happier (except taxpayers that enjoy paying the lowest possible amount of taxes - good thing there aren't too many of those people in Oklahoma!) would be to keep MAPS and increase the sales tax to be in line with other cities, using that additional revenue to address issues raised by Ed. Seems like a better approach than attacking MAPS and arguing our city is in the dumps (which as BoulderSooner alluded to, has not been a successful strategy in the past and I can say that it least for me, it won't be for the foreseeable future).

Also, the headline/thread title is laughable and completely undermines the argument (though this is common with headlines, so I suppose it is what it is).

[jerrywall]

this also should very much be in the politics section

I hope not. This is the type of thread that it seems like OKCTalk exists for, IMO, and shouldn't be relegated to the politics ghetto. Even if you disagree with the premise or the poster.

[jerrywall]

The problem is that this makes it seem like a zero sum game, like if money wasn't spend on maps it would have gone to other city services (the money wouldn't have likely existed). Additionally, it ignores the increased revenues that MAPS project contribute too. When we have more employers moving to OKC, and more sales tax revenues being generated. Would those sales tax revenue increases have happened without MAPS? That's additional recurring revenue.

(As for anyone feeling chastised for questions - excuse my why I marvel at the martyrdom being displayed. If you ask the same question 15 times and just keep ignoring the direct answers and responding with the same question, then yes, people will chastise you. Folks don't like wasting time.)

[Pete]

It does not belong in the politics section at all, so let's move on from that discussion.

[Timshel]

It does not belong in the politics section at all, so let's move on from that discussion.

Pete, this is a question that is not intended to be snarky in the slightest - but Mr. Shadid's post reads like a newspaper editorial - will we be seeing a version of this post in the Gazette at some point in the near future? Not making any judgments at all if so - just curious.