Tulsa City Council Approves Largest Budget In City History

The Tulsa City Council has approved the $945 million budget for the city’s upcoming fiscal year. One of the highlights includes a $16 minimum wage for all full-time employees. 

The city council says payroll will make up about 70% of the nearly $378 million general fund.

One of the big hot topics of the mayor’s budget was the Real-Time crime monitoring center.

It was approved last night and includes more than $3 million for the year.

Some residents question whether the center will make Tulsa safer and instead want more independent oversight of police or to scrap the project altogether and redirect those resources to mental health and crisis response.

$50,000 is being added to the police recruiting budget and there’s room for 20 new paramedics for the fire department. $166,000 has been assigned to get rid of graffiti around Tulsa.

About $142,000 will be dedicated towards new equipment, cleaning and repairs for Animal Welfare.

In city services, another one million dollars has been allotted to continue the 1921 Graves excavation and DNA analysis. There’s also funding allotted towards the city’s investments at Zink Lake and the Kirkpatrick Heights Master Plan. 

The budget now heads to Mayor GT Bynum’s desk for a signature ahead of the next fiscal year which starts July 1st.