Kyle Hilbert, Speaker Pro Tempore of the Oklahoma State House of Representatives, previewed the 2024 legislative session Monday at the Tulsa Regional Chamber’s Executive Committee meeting.

Katie Henke, senior vice president of government affairs for the Chamber, moderated the discussion with Hilbert, a Creek County Republican who was elected to the House in 2016 and became Pro Tem in 2022.

Important this year, he said, will be deciding how to apportion some of Oklahoma’s budget surplus of about $4.2 billion as inflation continues to heavily impact the private sectors and state agencies.

“Living through the downturns in 2017 and 2018 and then in 2020, I can say we definitely want to have some amount of reserves,” Hilbert said. “But at some point, taxpayers start saying,“What are you doing with all that, and why is that money not going out somewhere?’”

A week-long special legislative session that starts Monday will precede a regular session that begins Feb. 5.

Hilbert said 2024 deal-making already is off to a fast start, referring to the Chickasaw Nation and Apache Tribe recently agreeing to new state-tribal compacts on tobacco and license tags.

“I’m excited,” Hilbert said. “That’s really good news for the state, for both Governor Stitt and (Chickasaw Nation) Governor Anoatubby. Hopefully, it’s a sign of more good things to come.”

Among the legislative priorities, Hilbert said, will be addressing Tulsa’s aging levee system, which is a focus of the 2024 OneVoice Regional Legislative Agenda. A couple of bills have been filed to try to get state funding to match federal dollars available for the project, he said.

“I think we have one shot right here in the 2024 session to get these levees funded because that federal funding isn’t going to stick around forever,” Hilbert said. “If we miss this one shot, it may not be back.

“…We either pay for it now ahead of time or we pay for it later when an inevitable disaster strikes at some point.”

Asked by an executive committee member about education, the lawmaker said it’s time to start talking about results.

“One thing that we’ve said for many, many years is, ‘Thank God for Mississippi’ because they are always 50th in everything,” Hilbert said. “But they are making a lot of advancements. I don’t want to see the day where we go to these legislative conferences and everyone is saying, ‘Thank God for Oklahoma.’

“Reading, specifically, has received strong support. We need more engineers, yes. But if you can’t read, you can’t be an engineer. To me, as a non-educator, I feel like that’s the foundational building block of all this because if you’re behind in second grade, you’re so much more likely to be behind in sixth grade, which means you’re more likely to be behind in the 10th grade, which means you’re not going to college and you’re not going to be an engineer.”

Summing up, Hilbert said the key to smart legislation in 2024 will be cooperation.

“As we’ve seen many times, one (legislative) chamber cannot make law by themselves,” he said. “I want the state senate to be successful just like I want the state house to be successful because I want Oklahoma to be successful. I want Governor Stitt to be successful.

“We’ve got some opportunities ahead of us, and we need to make the most of this surplus and the position that we’re in….”