Relationship With County Impacts Race For Mayor
City-county relations color campaign for Tulsa mayor
BY KEVIN CANFIELD World Staff Writer
Sunday, September 08, 2013
Whenever he can, Mayor Dewey Bartlett makes a point of reminding people that during his term in office, relations between the city and county have gone swimmingly.
It’s a not-so-subtle swipe at his opponent in the Nov. 12 mayoral election, former Mayor Kathy Taylor.
Bartlett has a point: There have been fewer fights between the city and county since he took office in December 2009.
But there has been less to fight about, too.
Taylor was in office from 2006 to 2009, and as things would have it, she found herself on a few powder kegs – some of her own making, some not.
By the time Bartlett took office in December 2009, the fighting was over and the issues that had strained city/county relations had been resolved, for better or for worse: The city had annexed the fairgrounds; city voters had overwhelming agreed to capture the county’s Four to Fix the County sales tax to help fund the city’s 2008 Fix Our Streets package; and the city and county had a new jail agreement.