News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed
Rep. Tom Cole Says DOGE Is ‘Pretty Responsive’ to His Concerns
Rep. Tom Cole Says DOGE Is ‘Pretty Responsive’ to His Concerns
Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole told constituents with concerns about government-slashing efforts at the Department of Government Efficiency that he’d been able to get it to change course when it set its sights on projects related to his district.
He said he’d been able to get results by flagging issues to DOGE like any other agency, adding that while it’s made some mistakes in its efforts to cut spending, it had reversed course in at least one instance when his office brought an issue to its attention.
“We’ve found, at least, if you work it just like you would any other government agency, they can be pretty responsive,” Cole said in his telephone town hall on Thursday.
He pointed to his staff working with DOGE to get a Social Security office in Lawton, Oklahoma, off of a list of terminated contracts — one of many that DOGE reversed course on. He also largely defended DOGE’s work.
“We think this is a bad decision,” Cole said his office told DOGE about potentially closing the Social Security office. “And [DOGE] relooked at it and they agreed so. But this is where members have to be pretty aggressive and engaged.”
The Atlantic reported Wednesday that Cole met with Elon Musk over cigars and bourbon and advised the Trump ally, who heads DOGE, to consult lawmakers before making cuts. Cole said Musk had committed to fixing any errors.
“So far,” Cole told the magazine, “I’ve found them to be good to their word.”
Cole, the chair of the House Appropriations Committee, is one of several lawmakers elected to represent areas that President Donald Trump won who have faced questions from constituents this week about DOGE and the Trump administration’s efforts to expand executive power.
During his hour-long town hall, the majority of questions Cole faced from constituents were DOGE-related. Callers who said they were from Oklahoma brought up potential cuts to programs like Social Security and Indian Health Service. They also laid out concerns about federal office closures and layoffs.
Though the event wasn’t in person, the largely calm conversations Cole had were a tone shift from recent town halls held by Republicans — some of which caught enough attention that they resulted in the chair of the National Republican Congressional Committee advising representatives to stop hosting town halls in person. Now, while Congress is in recess, representatives on both sides of the aisle are catching heat from constituents.
Cole didn’t receive the same arguing, shouting and heckling as some of his colleagues. But, most callers were still worried about DOGE.
“I’m very concerned about Congress’s constitutional duties, that those are being taken over by DOGE,” one caller told Cole. “I would like to know what steps you’re willing to take to make sure that the constitutional duties of Congress remain with Congress, and not with the executive branch.”
Cole had a response ready.
“I try to do it by pretty aggressively defending congressional power,” Cole said. “I think there’s a lot of things out there that you hear that may or may not be true.”
He used the example of Tinker Air Force Base, located in Oklahoma, where rumored layoffs did not happen.
“We live in an extremely contentious time,” Cole said. “It’s a high degree of polarization and partisanship, but we also work together to get things done better than you may think. And so at the end of the day, I always just urge all of you to have confidence in the country’s institutions.”
This article first appeared on Oklahoma Watch and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
The post Rep. Tom Cole Says DOGE Is ‘Pretty Responsive’ to His Concerns appeared first on oklahomawatch.org
Oklahoma Watch, at oklahomawatch.org, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that covers public-policy issues facing the state.
News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed
Young photographer shoots for free, dedicated to his craft
SUMMARY: Hunter Shepard, a passionate young photographer from Oklahoma, captures high school sports moments for free, traveling across the state on his own dime. Despite being autistic and having ADHD, Hunter has an incredible memory and deep knowledge of sports. He takes professional-quality action shots and posts them online, only asking for donations. His kindness and dedication earned him recognition from Oklahoma’s News 4 “Pay It Forward” program. Surprised with \$400 for equipment and travel costs, Hunter humbly accepted the gift, emphasizing his love for photography and helping others preserve cherished memories of their “glory years” through his lens.
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News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed
Oklahoma Has Nation’s Highest Average Homeowners Insurance Premiums
After Oklahoma Watch debunked a claim that hail explained skyrocketing homeowners insurance rates, Oklahoma Insurance Department Commissioner Glen Mulready — who amplified the hail claims — backtracked in a statement published on the department’s website entitled “It’s Not Just Hail: A Look Into Oklahoma Homeowners Rates.”
According to a June 9 Lending Tree report, Oklahoma has the highest average homeowners insurance premium in the country at $6,133 per year, 2.2 times the national average of $2,801. Rates in Oklahoma have climbed 50.8% from 2019, the year Mulready took office, through 2024, rising faster than the national average of 40.4% the report said.
Mulready explained that insurance rates are driven by a combination of factors beyond hail, and championed the work of the department on behalf of consumers.
A new Oklahoma Watch investigation revealed some of these claims to be dubious.
A False Claim
Mulready said that the department fields complaints, enforces laws, and ensures that companies treat consumers fairly.
“We take action to protect consumers when insurers act illegally or violate contracts,” Mulready said.
Mulready said that $12 million was returned to consumers in 2024 by the Consumer Assistance/Claims Division of the OID. However, the Consumer Assistance/Claims Division has no impact on homeowners rates as set by insurance companies.
Mulready said that Oklahoma law prevents the OID from interfering on rates.
“OID has no statutory authority to set or approve homeowners rates except in certain, extraordinary circumstances,” Mulready said.
He went on to claim that 38 states follow a similar model.
That is false.
Mulready ignored the fact that Oklahoma’s tornado alley neighbors, Texas and Kansas, which by various measures enjoy lower homeowners insurance rates while suffering from weather conditions similar to or worse than Oklahoma, follow the same model but do in fact perform regulatory work to approve rates.
The difference is the role of actuaries, the number crunchers of the insurance world.
The Last of the Actuaries
“What I’ve found is that most people have not heard of us,” said Thomas Cummins, 83, who as far as he knows is the only independent actuary left in the state of Oklahoma.
Originally from Duncan, Cummins studied math at Oklahoma State University, but had to go to the University of Iowa to study actuarial science, which he defined as the effort to measure the financial impact of certain occurrences on financial markets or people.
Actuaries are financial statisticians, Cummins said. When they are employed by an insurance company, their role is to ensure that the company has enough money to cover claims on the policies they have written.
Cummins said there are about 30,000 actuaries in the United States, but he was aware of only three in Oklahoma: an actuary who lives in Tulsa but does most of his work in California, another actuary who is employed by Blue Cross Blue Shield, and Cummins himself, in business since 1981 and the last independent actuary working in the state, as far as he knows.
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Kim Holland, who served as Oklahoma’s insurance commissioner from 2005 to 2011, recalled that an actuary had been employed on the health side of the department during her tenure, but at that time there was no actuary on the property and casualty side, which included homeowners insurance.
Today, OID does employ a chief actuary. According to OID’s 2024 annual report, the chief actuary is Andy Schallhorn, who is also the deputy commissioner in charge of the financial division. Schallhorn’s job is described as monitoring the financial solvency of insurance companies and working to ensure compliance with Oklahoma law.
Oklahoma law is the problem.
The Devil in the Details
Mulready’s claim that Oklahoma’s insurance model matched that of 38 other states ignored significant state-to-state variety.
“All states have different regulatory requirements and prerogatives that vary on the needs and dynamics of that particular state,” Holland said.
Rich Gibson of the American Academy of Actuaries said what Mulready likely meant was that 38 states operate on what’s known as a file-and-use model.
File-and-use means insurance companies file rate changes and put them into use immediately to charge customers; states that scrutinize rate filings before they are put into use are known as prior approval states.
That’s where it gets tricky, because there are significant differences that separate file-and-use states.
In Texas and Kansas, when filings are put into use, actuaries immediately review them to ensure that rates are adequate (to protect insurance companies), not excessive (to protect consumers), or unfairly discriminatory.
The critical difference: Oklahoma does not examine rates to protect consumers. In fact, Oklahoma law prevents the Insurance Department from protecting consumers by ensuring that rates are not excessive.
“OID has no statutory authority to set or approve homeowners rates except in certain, extraordinary circumstances.”
Glen Mulready
When Mulready said that Oklahoma may set or approve rates only in extraordinary circumstances, he was not citing a similarity between Oklahoma and other states; rather, he was referencing a significant distinction between Oklahoma and its file-and-use, tornado alley neighbors.
Specifically, the automatic process of actuarial scrutiny in Texas and Kansas is applied to every rate filing. By way of contrast, Oklahoma can scrutinize rate filings only if the commissioner has previously found the market to be non-competitive.
As Oklahoma Watch documented in its original investigation, the process for declaring a non-competitive market is legally murky and not widely understood; it’s unclear whether the state’s lone 2016 invocation of the non-competitive market statute was fully legal.
Also unclear is the precise job of the chief actuary. The 2024 annual report made a brief reference to the chief actuary protecting consumers, but how the actuary can protect consumers when the law prevents scrutiny of excessive rates is an open question.
In response to an interview request, Mulready cited dissatisfaction with Oklahoma Watch’s original story. He indicated that he had instructed the public agency’s staff to no longer engage with Oklahoma Watch.
“We will not be participating in this story,” Mulready said in an email.
Texas and Kansas Save Consumers Millions
The Texas Department of Insurance employs 18 actuaries to review rate filings, of whom 12 are dedicated to scrutinizing an annual average of 3,000 property and casualty filings, which include homeowners insurance.
Texas Department of Insurance actuaries submit questions to insurance companies or request changes on approximately 75% of filings; 10% of filings are withdrawn or rejected.
Since 2021, actuarial review of filings has saved Texas consumers $131.7 million, a TDI spokesman said in a written statement.
The Kansas Insurance Department employs a Chief of Actuarial Services and utilizes a pool of consulting actuaries to evaluate hundreds of property and casualty rate filings annually, said KID Deputy Chief of Staff Kyle Strathman.
Filings are evaluated for rate reasonableness, to ensure that rates are not excessive, inadequate or unfairly discriminatory.
“If a filing is found to be out of compliance, the carrier is required to make an adjustment to the filing,” Strathman said, while declining to provide a precise dollar estimate on what the rate review process saves consumers each year.
It’s not Just Homeowners Insurance
Rather than encouraging competition by advising consumers to discriminate and shop among insurance companies, an I-44 billboard featuring Commissioner Mulready’s face alongside images of severe weather incidents sends a dire message: you can’t fight higher rates, so batten down the hatches and ride out the storm.
The problem of rising property insurance rates extends beyond homeowners insurance.
Sherie Donahay, president of the Bradbury Corner Homeowners’ Association in Edmond, reached out to OID to complain when the association’s rates skyrocketed despite the fact that Bradbury Corner had few assets to insure.
“I know the policy had doubled since 2023,” Donahay said, adding that she was aware of rate increases at other HOAs as well.
Donahay expressed her concern to OID that Bradbury Corner was being used to cover costs in other states where there were huge homeowners associations.
“I continue to see record profits on Wall Street by insurance companies.”
Keith Easley
In 2023, Sasakwa Public Schools Superintendent Kyle Wilson was featured in a story about rapidly rising property insurance rates for schools; Wilson fretted over whether out-of-control rate hikes would affect his ability to hire much-needed teachers.
Since then, Wilson said, rates had continued to rise for Sasakwa Public Schools; the anticipated 2026 rate of $151,000 was more than three times the 2020 rate of $45,000.
Insurance Companies Review Themselves, Actually
Oklahoma law does require insurance companies to submit an annual statement of actuarial opinion; however, the statement, by law, is authored by the company’s own appointed actuary.
In Oklahoma, insurance companies review themselves, actually.
Former commissioner Holland noted that during her tenure OID worked to clean up old regulations, and interacted with lawmakers constantly to suggest legislative changes.
Holland recalled that she had support from both political parties during her time in office. It helped that she had worked in insurance her whole career; she wasn’t hostile to the industry, but continued to believe that oversight was necessary.
“Do I think they need to be held accountable?” Holland said. “I did then, and I do now.”
In Oklahoma Watch’s original investigation, former legislator Kevin Easley, who championed a law that was later warped into the statutes that now govern homeowners insurance, spoke passionately about the changes to the legislation he had helped pass.
“They can damn sure change it back, can’t they?” Easley said at the time.
Now an oil and gas executive, Easley seconded Holland’s nostalgia for a time when agency heads worked closely with lawmakers to make problem-solving recommendations.
Easley was unimpressed with Mulready’s description of Oklahoma’s insurance model. Regardless of whether the model was similar to other states, Easley doubted whether 38 states were having the same kinds of problems Oklahoma is having.
“I continue to see record profits on Wall Street by insurance companies,” Easley said. “If the model in Oklahoma does not provide the authority to get involved in setting rates that are market-based, then maybe Mulready needs to be recommending to the legislature that the model be changed. If the model isn’t working, we should be changing the model.”
This article first appeared on Oklahoma Watch and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
The post Oklahoma Has Nation’s Highest Average Homeowners Insurance Premiums appeared first on oklahomawatch.org
Oklahoma Watch, at oklahomawatch.org, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that covers public-policy issues facing the state.
Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.
Political Bias Rating: Left-Leaning
This article from Oklahoma Watch presents a critical examination of Insurance Commissioner Glen Mulready’s claims and the broader policy framework governing homeowners insurance in Oklahoma. While it cites factual data and sources, the language and framing—such as labeling Mulready’s statements as “false,” using pointed headlines like “Insurance Companies Review Themselves, Actually,” and concluding with statements emphasizing corporate profits—indicate a skeptical stance toward deregulated markets and industry-friendly policy. The article implicitly advocates for stronger regulatory oversight, aligning with policy preferences typically associated with the political left, thus suggesting a left-leaning bias in tone and presentation.
News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed
FEMA pulls back funding for Norman's flood alert system
SUMMARY: FEMA has abruptly withdrawn funding promised to Norman, Oklahoma, for a life-saving flood warning system. The federal government labeled the grant program supporting this project as wasteful and ineffective, despite its potential to prevent tragedies like recent deadly floods in Texas. Norman faces losing $350,000 vital to building the early detection system, with officials struggling to find alternative resources. Local leaders, including Senator Mary Boren, criticize the decision as politically motivated and detrimental to community safety. Meanwhile, the city emphasizes its ongoing commitment to public safety through existing monitoring methods while seeking new funding to advance flood preparedness.
FEMA pulls back funding for Norman’s flood alert system
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