Speaking to educators at this year’s annual CareerTech conference, Lieutenant Governor Jari Askins told teachers they aren’t alone in feeling pain at the pump.  Afterwards, I asked her about the impact fuel prices are having on our economy.
Rob:  Governor Askins, how much of an impact has the cost of fuel had on our economy from everything from our schools to our businesses?
Jari Askins:  Well you know the State of Oklahoma does benefit from the high gas prices because of the increased production and the amount of revenue that does come to the State of Oklahoma, but it costs us in so many other ways not just certainly the obvious is in fuel costs for state agencies, the highway patrol, when you have schools that have school buses, there is just such an increase in budgets that were not necessarily funded because it was a pretty flat revenue year.  So it’s a huge challenge for like the CareerTech system, for the educational system when operational dollars have not been increased in appropriations and yet certainly the expenses have increased.