Oklahoma House Democrats are not jumping at Gov. Mary Fallin's call to back the Step Up Oklahoma plan.
House Minority Leader Steve Kouplen had his own take on Fallin calling it a lifeline from the business community.
"A drowning man will grab any lifeline, whether it’s a good one or not," Kouplen said. "The one that’s been thrown to us, we think it needs to be tweaked."
Rep. Emily Virgin said negotiations that began last month continue, but threats to health care, education or human service funding won’t push them along.
"There have been some comments about what will happen if we don’t vote for this. Those certainly aren’t constructive conversations for us. We hope that that doesn’t continue," Virgin said.
A nonstarter so far for Democrats has been a proposed gross production tax on renewable energy of $1 per megawatt hour of electricity produced.
They're also opposed to plans to move the gross production tax on oil and gas from 2 to 4 percent on existing wells and to tax new oil and gas wells at 4 percent for 36 months.
"This Step Up Oklahoma plan that you see before you is nothing more than a ploy by the oil and gas industry to avoid a ballot issue in November where Oklahomans overwhelmingly will adopt a restoration of the gross production tax to 7 percent," said Rep. Cory Williams.
Another sticking point for Democrats is the income tax changes in the Step Up Oklahoma plan, which they say don't do enough to help low- and middle-income Oklahomans.
They want to see the top income tax rate set at 5.25 rather than 5 percent, the state standard deduction once again tied to the federal standard deduction and restoration of the Earned Income Tax Credit.
Virgin said Monday Democrats will accept the proposed fuel tax increase. Williams praised Fallin for continuing to call for criminal justice reforms.
