Oklahoma Lawmaker Creates Bill To End Time Changes

Daylight Saving Time starts this weekend, which means it is almost time to move your locks ahead an hour. Some state lawmakers want to end the time change by keeping clocks permanently on either standard or daylight saving time.

Lawmakers say the constant springing forward, then falling back, causes lots of health and safety risks. There’s also the headache of having to change the clock.

At Grandfather’s Clock Gallery near 11th and Peoria, the time change is an hours-long process.

“If you go too fast, it can cause the chime to get stuck,” said Talitha Grether, owner. “We try to catch all of them, but if one gets missed, that can create problems where we think something’s wrong with it, and we have to go back and work on it when nothing was wrong with it.”

Grether is in favor of the time change coming to an end, and she’s not alone.

Several measures have gone through the state legislature to get rid of the change, but there is a divide on which way to go. State Representative Kevin West’s bill called for the clocks to be kept on standard time, which most people refer to as “falling back.”

“The federal law allows us to opt out of daylight saving time,” said West. “It does not allow us to opt out of standard time.”

State Senator Blake Stephens’ proposal is to keep the incoming change permanent.

“Once we get on daylight saving time again, my proposition is we won’t get off that again,” said Stephens.

Stephens says his bill would be triggered if federal laws allow states to stay on daylight saving time.

“Simply, all I’m doing is adjusting the clock,” he said.

Stephens says his bill will be heard on the Senate floor on Monday. West’s bill did not make it to a vote.