Broken Arrow voters approve bond package

Broken Arrow officials are celebrating. Voters have approved the biggest bond package in that city's history. The four part package is worth $53-million. <br/><br/>Proposition 1 is for road improvements.

Tuesday, May 11th 2004, 10:04 am

By: News On 6

Broken Arrow officials are celebrating. Voters have approved the biggest bond package in that city's history. The four part package is worth $53-million.

Proposition 1 is for road improvements. it passed with 73% of the vote.

Proposition 2 upgrades the fire department and a 911call center. It was easily approved with 70%.

Proposition 3 is for parks and recreation. 64% of the voters gave their "okay."

And the bulk of Proposition 4 would pay for a conference center.
It passed with 58% of the vote.

In other elections Tuesday:

Lawton voters approved $29.8 million to fund improvements in the school system;

Two separate quarter-cent sales tax increases were approved in Durant to build a new $9 million community center with an Olympic-size swimming pool and to fund $8 million in projects, including new ball fields, a 10-acre lake with walking trail and new turf at Southeastern Oklahoma State University's football field;

A $7.8 million bond issue for a new middle school was rejected in Sallisaw, where a proposal to replace an aging 50-year-old middle school also failed;

Funding for a new $4.97 million high school in Lone Grove was approved;

Checotah voters, for the fourth time, turned down a nearly $3 million bond issue to fund a new events center for school and community use. The measure received 56 percent of the vote but needed 60 percent;

A penny sales tax was renewed for five years in Craig County to fund a county ambulance service, roads, law enforcement and other county needs;

Muskogee voters approved a one-cent sales tax to renovate a civic center and adjacent festival center and a separate 3/4-cent sales tax for funding of salaries and benefits for police, firefighters and other nonuniformed city workers;

Major County voters defeated a measure to implement a sales tax of three-fifths of a cent and passed a measure to eliminate the personal property tax. Major County remains one of only eight Oklahoma counties without a county sales tax. Promoters said the personal property tax adjustment would cut down assessing procedures without affecting the revenue stream.