State Sen. Kathleen Wilcoxson is touting legislation she says could generate an additional $2 million a year in savings for college. Wilcoxson’s measure, Senate Bill 1307, would offer employers a tax credit for contributing to an employee’s savings account. She said the idea behind the bill, was to help more Oklahomans earn college degrees.

A key plank of the Senate Democratic agenda to strengthen small business won the approval of a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee today, making access to affordable healthcare one step closer to becoming a reality for all Oklahomans. Senate Bill 1294, authored by Senator Tom Adelson, expands the Insure Oklahoma program to include small businesses with 50 or fewer employees. The program, created by Democrats, allows small business owners the opportunity to provide health insurance to their employees at affordable rates.

Legislation to require children and teenagers to take a boating safety course before operating a jet ski or other water craft has cleared its first legislative hurdle. Senate Bill 1495, known as the Kyle Williams Boating Safety Education Act, won approval from the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Public Safety and Judiciary on Wednesday morning. The legislation is named for a 12-year-old Oklahoma boy who died as a result of a jet ski accident in August, 2004.

* Rural GOP Senators Pledge to Fight Forced School Consolidation & Seek Funding for Roads & Bridges, Rural Firefighters

The elimination of the state’s death tax tops the list of 2006 legislative priorities for rural Republican state senators, members of the Senate Republican Rural Caucus announced Wednesday.

The Senate Appropriations Sub-Committee on Education gave approval Wednesday to legislation that will make more children from middle class homes eligible to participate in the Oklahoma Higher Learning Access Program.

Senate Bill 1993 by Senate President Pro Tempore Mike Morgan raises the maximum income eligibility for OHLAP from $50,000 to $75,000.

Senate Republican Leader Glenn Coffee praised “Rose Day” participants who rallied at the state Capitol Wednesday, and credited them for last year’s passage of pro-life legislation for the first time in a generation.

“Senate Republicans are very pleased to welcome the Rose Day participants to the Oklahoma State Capitol today, and we praise them for the tireless efforts in support of the unborn,” stated Coffee, R-Oklahoma City.

After working closely all summer with corrections officials, and even convening a special session to deal with Oklahoma’s public safety crisis, the Oklahoma State Senate passed a $24 million supplemental appropriation for the Oklahoma Department of Corrections (DOC) today.

Legislation has been introduced by State Senator Don Barrington, R-Lawton, that will help protect the jobs of volunteer firefighters who are called to duty while at work by offering tax incentives to businesses that hire these individuals.

Legislation that will keep tickets to Oklahoma City Hornets games among the lowest in the league and complete the incentive package that helped lure the National Basketball Association team to the Ford Center earlier this year passed out of the Senate Finance Committee Tuesday.

Senate Bill 1022 is authored by Senate President Pro Tempore Mike Morgan. The measure exempts tickets to NBA and NHL games in Oklahoma from sales tax.

Just days after the State Senate’s Democrat President Pro Tem Mike Morgan said he has “great fear and trepidation” about reducing taxes this legislative session, the Democrat chairman of the Senate Finance Committee left the two most important tax reform issues off the schedule at the committee’s first meeting on Tuesday, February 7.