Oklahoma debate over luring NBA team to state reveals rural-urban division in legislature

In recent weeks, we highlighted Oregon as an example of growing rural-urban splits, and Oklahoma provides another. Legislators there are at odds over an incentive package aimed at luring the Seattle SuperSonics, an National Basketball Association team, to Oklahoma City, with urban lawmakers in favor of the plan and rural lawmakers against it. "The vote on the Sonics' legislation, like past votes on other measures involving economic development and tax policy, reflected a political division between rural and urban lawmakers that often runs deeper than differences between political parties," writes Tim Talley of The Associated Press.

By a bipartisan vote, the incentive plan passed and the NBA signed off on the Sonics' move to Oklahoma City for the 2008-09 season. In an early version of the bill, one lawmaker added an amendment to provide incentives for physicians who relocated to rural areas. That amendment brought more rural support for the incentive plan, but it was removed in the final version. Rural lawmakers told Talley think their areas have needs greater than Oklahoma City's desire for an NBA team. "It's probably less about party than it is the need in rural Oklahoma," said Rep. Don Armes, R-Faxon, one of several lawmakers from rural areas who voted against the Sonics' bill. "We get kind of ignored in the rural areas where the need really is."

One lawmaker, Sen. Jim Wilson, D-Tahlequah, said the episode reminded him of his attempt to entice a company to rural northeastern Oklahoma, a firm that would have generated an economic impact of $261 million. Wilson, however, was unsuccessful in securing the $600,000 he needed to improve the proposed site for the plant. "We just feel sometimes like nobody's listening," Wilson told Talley. "We're just at a disadvantage. We don't have the same procedure available to us as the big cities do to get things done." (Read more)