It is Wednesday, February 25th. My name is Ryan Welton, and this is the Oklahoma Memo newscast.
[singing] Oklahoma Memo to start my, Oklahoma Memo to start my, Oklahoma Memo to start my day. Oh, oh, oh, oh.
Well, this is the first edition of the Oklahoma Memo newscast, and that music right there was a little tune I actually played and sang on my piano here at home and then put into Suno.
So if you're sounding-- if, if you're saying to yourself, "It sounds like AI," well, it kinda is, but I do have the evidence here on my phone that I recorded videos this morning of me singing and arranging those songs.
You see the piano back here. I'm a lifelong songwriter and music producer, so... But I'm also a journalist, a longtime journalist.
And topping the Oklahoma Memo newsletter today was the story from Nuria Martinez-Kiel of Oklahoma Voice.
The headline, "Senate plan would spend two hundred and fifty-four million to improve reading scores, raise Oklahoma teacher pay." I'll just read you the lead.
You can get the full story at Oklahoma Voice at their website.
"A two hundred and fifty-four million dollar plan from Senate Republican leadership would raise teacher pay, support literacy initiatives, and increase funding for public and private school students by capping extra funds put into the state's teacher pension system.
Improving the state's poor elementary reading scores has been a top issue for lawmakers this year, and a Senate announcement on Tuesday, coincidentally falling on the Capital's Public Schools Day, revealed the first plan to do so," the first funding plan.
I will tell you, this drew swift reaction, uh, from teachers, and I'll just pull from a story that will be in Thursday's Oklahoma Memo from Anna Coleto at Tulsa Flyer. "A terrible idea.
Teachers say Senate plan for education reforms with retirement money creates bigger problems."
I will tell you, I've got a lot of teacher friends, a lot of friends in the public education world, and they're all saying this is robbing Peter to pay Paul.
But the-- a quick preview of the lead from Anna in today's Tulsa Flyer that will be in tomorrow's, Thursday's Oklahoma Memo.
"Teacher reactions to the Oklahoma Senate's two hundred and fifty-four million dollar education plan came swiftly Tuesday.
They say the state already tried dipping into the teacher pension contributions to pay for education reforms once before, and trying it again is a terrible idea.
The package would redirect planned contributions to the state's teacher retirement system, a fund that supports more than seventy thousand retirees annually.
The money would instead support the Senate's education priorities, including a twenty-five hundred dollar raise for Oklahoma teachers, fifty million to the Strong Readers Act, and twenty-five million more for the Parental Choice Tax Credit Act."
I had a great conversation with a, uh, by email with an Oklahoma Memo subscriber this morning. I think, and I'm not referring to our conversation, but I think in general, a misconception that people have is that when
people ask for education to be funded, they're not really just talking about teacher salaries.
They're talking about more teachers so that classrooms aren't overwhelmed, better resources, and to model the success that, uh, has happened in some of the southern states.
And that leads me to a story from Oklahoma Watch that will be leading tomorrow's Oklahoma Memo from Jennifer Palmer, who has a great Education Watch newsletter that you should look at and subscribe to.
Her headline, "From top half to near last: How Oklahoma schools lost three decades of ground and what can be learned from Mississippi." I haven't even read this full story yet, and I can't wait to dig in.
But that's essentially-- that was the crux of the conversation I had with the viewer this morning.
I wanna share just a little bit of, of what they wrote because it, it makes a lot of sense, and it sounds like this person knows a lot more about the machinations of the funding than I do.
Uh, they write, "The pay has gone up a lot in the last few years, but results from education have gone down. A few years ago, the teachers' retirement was only about seventy-three percent funded.
When a yearly COLA is made to deserving retired teachers, then they can request money from retirement systems." So there you have it. Again, uh, my friends in public education and teachers are all saying the same thing.
This is robbing Peter to pay Paul, but that was the big story in today's Oklahoma Memo, and it will be again the big story in Thursday's Oklahoma Memo. [upbeat music] I've got some breaking news.
I've got to tell you. Breaking news also in the world of education. Bixby Superintendent Rob Miller has announced that he will not run for state superintendent. He's dropping his bid.
For those of you who didn't know, he lost his wife, Anna, unexpectedly a couple of weeks ago, several weeks ago now.
And it's, uh, it's been hard for him, hard for his family, and he posted this very heartfelt message to Facebook. And for those of you who aren't aware, he was probably the favorite to win the state superintendency.
But he says he will stay committed to public education.
He wrote, "Exactly one year ago today, I traveled to the state capital to begin a journey I believed would be-- would lead to serving Oklahoma as state superintendent.
I could not have imagined then how much my life would change in twelve short months. Sadly, today, I am announcing that I am ending my campaign.
In the few weeks since Anna's passing, I have surrounded-- I have been surrounded by extraordinary love and encouragement.
I am deeply grateful for the many friends and supporters who have reached out with kindness, prayers, and support." Uh, if you'll recall, during the Ryan Walters era, Rob Miller was a, uh, very vocal opponent.
Rob's a Republican. Ryan's a Republican. But Rob was very instrumental, uh, in standing up to be vocal against Walters.
Our thoughts and prayers are definitely with Rob Miller and his family.And now it's time for a new and recurring segment on the Oklahoma Memo newscast that I'm calling Three Things You Need to Know, where I offer headlines, tidbits, weather information, you name it, that will help you get through your day.
Cue the lyrics. [singing] Three things you need to know. Three things you need to know. Ba, ba, boo, doo. Three things
you need to know. Three things you need to know. Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin confronts Representative Al Green during the State of the Union address, a story written by my friend Drake Johnson at News on 6.
You may have seen it in some of the coverage last night, but, um, there was a, uh, a, an incident between Mullin and Al Green of Texas.
Green was holding up a sign that read, "Black people aren't apes," of course, referring to the video that President Trump shared and never apologized for.
Of course, you'll recall that Representative Green was escorted out of the State of the Union last year, so it's become a new tradition in DC, right next to the blossoming of those cherry blossoms. Um,
but Mullin issued a statement to Griffin Media that, um, I don't... Let me just read it to you. It says, "Al Green is an idiot who does nothing but political theater.
This is why he's going to lose his primary big next week. Even my kids know there's a time and place for every- everything.
That wasn't the time or the place for that kind of behavior from him," Mullin said in a statement. In a separate post on his X account, Mullin wrote that, quote, "He cannot stand the man from Texas called Al Green."
Weird, weird phraseology. Second thing that you need to know is, if you don't know where your umbrellas are, go get them. I've just been checking my, um, my forecast here, and I just watched David Payne on the TV.
There's gonna be rain in the forecast starting Sunday, pretty much all next week, and a lot of the forecasters I'm seeing on social, including on TV, say there's gonna be a severe risk from Wednesday to Friday of next week.
So if you don't have a severe weather plan, do so. If you don't have a favorite meteorologist, get one, and, uh, you know, watch them faithfully. That's what adults do.
They pay attention, they watch the news, and they w- you know, get a forecast. Um, and then the third thing you need to know, Boomer Sooner, but the Sooners pulled out a bottom-of-the-ninth win over Arizona State.
You'll notice the flag behind me. OU, I mean, my undergraduate is from OU, but my graduate degree is from Arizona State. Arizona State won big yesterday, 15 to 3. OU won today. I think that's only fair.
It, it was a win-win for me, one way or the other. Love the Sun Devils. Love the Sooners, obviously.
And now it's time for another segment, because as somebody who grew up in Henryetta and Muskogee and whose first job was in Hugo, Oklahoma, I don't like ignoring or forgetting about the small towns.
So this is for our segment about small town news. [singing] Why don't you cover the small towns? Why don't you give us their news?
Why don't you cover the small towns? That's what I'm doing now. That is what I'm doing now. I would say that this is sponsored by Dairy Queen or some IGA somewhere, but it's not sponsored by anybody just yet.
It's just kind of a cool-sounding Dixie Chicks-like tune. Our first story from the small town comes from KSWO. OSBI investigating Harmon County Sheriff's Office following sheriff's resignation.
You may remember this breaking news over the, the weekend, but Sheriff Steve Cornett and several members of the sheriff's office announced their resignation.
Well, now we've learned that the Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation is investigating that sheriff's office, uh, what they believe may be a violation of the Oklahoma Computer Crimes Act. Don't know what that is,
so we'll just have to stay tuned to that story. And our other story in the small town segment today is a good news story that is sort of built on the back of something very unfortunate.
Uh, Bryan County ranchers rally to st- send supplies to Beaver County wildfire victims. So that's far southern Oklahoma sending up to the panhandle in Beaver County. This one from KXXI Channel 12 in southern Oklahoma.
The reporter, Mia Medelin, or Medellin, from Durant.
Bryan County ranchers and farmers loaded up before sunrise Saturday to deliver hay and supplies to Beaver County, where wildfires have burned nearly 300,000 acres across northwestern Oklahoma.
That's nearly 17 times the size of Durant. Lindsey Roberts of Bryan Agri Products said, "There was a massive effort this last weekend to take hay to the northwestern part of Oklahoma for the relief of those wildfires.
Ranchers affected by the fires need food for their livestock, tools, and fencing. Organizers said residents called in one after another to contribute hay, money, or time." That is The Oklahoma Standard.
A quick look at Oklahoma Memo, the newsletter from Wednesday. There were, um, uh, there was a second big story, this one from, uh, Ashlyn Becht at The Frontier. I hope I pronounced her last name right.
I remember when it was Huffman, but this is now, it's B-E-C-H-T, so I'm going to guess Becht. But she has a follow-up on a story that I, I brought you, or that was included in the Oklahoma Memo several days ago.
Outcry over 73-day prison stay spurs push to tighten Oklahoma early release program. The story of Michela Borrego, uh, who was injured by Sarah Polston in an accident in Cleveland County, uh, three years ago.
You'll wanna check that out, a link in Wednesday's Oklahoma Memo. And then the Oklahoma Rundown.
That is the most popular part of the entire newsletter, where I go site to site and I curate the best journalism from across the state.
We have State Impact Oklahoma, all the Oklahoma City stations, Oklahoma Voice like usual, Tulsa World, KOCO, Tulsa Flyer, The Cherokee Phoenix, NonDoc, and KSWO.
A heart-It's just a heart-touching story about an Oklahoma couple living with ALS, grateful for renewed awareness. The gentleman in that story has lived with Lou Gehrig's disease now for nine years.
That's really incredible, particularly on the news recently that Eric Dane died after only 10 months. And then there's a segment that my buddy Jeremy, he was also the officiant at my wedding.
We went to high school together. We've been friends for 41 years. That's hard to believe, or at least 40 years. OSU wrestling sends a message. Maybe you're not a big OSU fan. Maybe you're not a wrestling fan.
But OSU had a big win over Iowa, 32-11, in a dual meet over the weekend. And Jeremy talks all about it. And the crowd was amazing. I mean, vocal, they got into it. The production crew does a great job.
I mean, it's an absolute show. If you come to an OSU wrestling meet, you will not be bored. It's like the NBA. There is always something going on between, you know, each match.
There's music or videos or they'll introduce an old cowboy or something. And so it's just a grand show all the way around with videos. Like yesterday, Dan Cormier led the team out.
Dan Cormier is a former cowboy wrestler, all-American, also a UFC champion fighter, and one of the main UFC guys for TV. I mean, if you wrestle or you fight, you know Dan Cormier. And so he led the team out yesterday.
You know, it's cool that he flew in from California to do that. We've actually had some conversations about Bedlam Buds and where it's going because there's so much Sooner talk, and I'm a Sooner,
but there's so much Sooner talk in the market, we feel like there's a massive gap in all things OSU. So we're going to really focus Bedlam Buds on all things OSU.
And that can't change that I'm an OU fan and that I'm an OU graduate. However, look, I grew up in Oklahoma. I lived two blocks from OSU Tech in Okmulgee as I was growing up.
And my grandfather is an alum of Oklahoma State. So it's also in the family. And that's going to do it for the first edition of the Oklahoma Memo newscast.
Whether you're checking us out at the start of your day or at the end of your day or somewhere in between, we're glad that you're here. Hope that you will like and subscribe.
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And you can get there at oklahomamemo.com slash subscribe. You can also message me anytime. I will reply to anybody and everybody who messages me at news at oklahomamemo.com. For Ryan, that's me. That's it.
I'm the producer. I wrote the music. This is what we do. It's the Oklahoma Memo newscast. Welcome aboard.