Bill seeks to stop Oklahoma agencies’ rules from taking effect without legislative OK

OKLAHOMA CITY — Rather than punting the responsibility to the governor, a bill moving through the legislative process would require the Legislature to proactively approve changes to state agencies’ rules. 

Oklahoma’s current administrative rules process requires all submitted rules to be reviewed by the Legislature, but if lawmakers take no action, they are sent to the governor. If the governor also declines to act, the rules automatically go into effect.

Senate Bill 995, authored by Rep. Gerrid Kendrix, R-Altus, would require the Legislature to approve all rules through a joint resolution. Any that are not explicitly approved would be considered disapproved. 

Proactive approval used to be required for the Legislature, Kendrix said, but the process was changed over a decade ago. 

Usually a dry topic, administrative rules have the force of law and are designed to build upon the statutes legislators create. 

“Myself, as an elected legislator, if I run legislation and I can’t get it taken up on the floor, what happens to it? It dies,” he said. “But that’s not what happens with the rules. So we have granted a little more authority to unelected bureaucrats, agency directors. I don’t want to be mean, but we’ve allowed that more authority to them than to the elected legislator.”

The measure is an attempt to add more light and transparency to the process and to involve more people in conversations, he said. 

Last year, lawmakers faced criticism for refusing to vote on a controversial set of 20 rules proposed by the Oklahoma State Department of Education. One of the more controversial rules tied a school’s state test scores to its accreditation. Lawmakers sent the rules to Gov. Kevin Stitt, who approved them all. 

Kendrix, who chairs the House Administrative Rules Committee, said the full Legislature hasn’t taken action on administrative rules since he was elected in 2020. He said this year there are over 5,000 pages of rule packets riddled with mistakes. 

“I’m trying to bring transparency to it, which in turn creates accountability,” Kendrix said. “It creates more structure and attention to the rules. I mean, we have rules coming in that have incomplete sentences, that have words that are misspelled, and being a (certified public accountant), I’m a detailed guy. And so if we have things like that that are happening, what else is happening?”

SB995 is a “piece of the puzzle” to bring more transparency since there has been increased interest from Republicans and Democrats on the issue in recent years, he said.

The legislation has had strong bipartisan support, he said. The bill unanimously cleared the state Senate and a House committee. It awaits a hearing before the full House.

Kendrix and Sen. Micheal Bergstrom, R-Adair, the Senate author, held an interim study in October to explore the idea for the measure. 

As a House committee made changes to the bill, the Senate will reconsider the amended version if it passes off the House floor.