On the Waiting List, for Life
For some people, time spent on the waiting list to get aid for developmental disabilities can seem like a lifetime. For others, it practically is a lifetime.
Oklahoma Watch (https://oklahomawatch.org/)
The destruction of two elementary schools by a tornado in Moore prompts some lawmakers to call for more funding to add safe rooms to schools.
Plaza Towers Elementary, the school in Moore where children died in a massive tornado strike today, has about 440 students, most of them low-income.
This interactive wheel lets you track the state budget by category -- and see changes over last year and since 2009.
A consultant hired by Oklahoma to propose ideas on state health care for the uninsured is recommending the state adopt a plan similar to one in Arkansas that channels state and federal money to private insurers. The earliest realistic time to implement that plan would be in 2015, the company said.
Hospitals in Oklahoma charge very different amounts for the same medical treatment, even within a city or community. Now, with this interactive, you can see what those charges are.
For some people, time spent on the waiting list to get aid for developmental disabilities can seem like a lifetime. For others, it practically is a lifetime.

Women make up a slight majority of Oklahomans, but that doesn’t translate into representation in the Legislature and Congress. Oklahoma has the fourth lowest percentage of female legislators in the nation, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. There are four women among 48 Senate members, and 16 women among 101 House members. Altogether, women [...]
Undocumented immigrants given temporary legal status under a new immigration bill would be denied access to Medicaid and other subsidized insurance offered under the federal health-reform law. That would mean thousands of immigrants, while waiting for up to 10 years to be fully legalized, would likely continue turning to Oklahoma hospitals, clinics and other providers [...]

The amount of money owed to Oklahoma mineral-rights owners who can’t be located has exploded in recent years as oil and gas production increased sharply across the state. Most owners will never know that they’re missing out on their share of the state’s oil and gas boom.

Oklahoma City has joined Tulsa in pursuit of a seemingly impossible goal: to eliminate chronic homelessness within two years. Both are using a strategy that breaks from conventional wisdom.
An Oklahoma Watch project on Hispanic immigration was awarded first place in general news reporting in the Great Plains Journalism Awards, in which publications and news sites from eight central U.S. states compete.
Q: Does it matter that Oklahoma has relatively few teachers with master’s degrees?
Q: Are Oklahomans falling for another version of predatory loans?

More than a fifth of Oklahomans under the age of 65 do not have health insurance, giving the state the sixth highest uninsured rate in the nation.
