County Commish Ken Doke to hold reelection campaign kickoff

Muskogee County Commissioner Ken Doke will be holding a reelection campaign kickoff reception on Thursday, October 21st, at 5pm. The event is sponsored, in part, by several local GOP legislators, including Rep. Avery Frix, Sen. Kim David, and Sen. Dwayne Pemberton. 

Doke became the first Republican to win his seat when he won in 2014. Doke has been a great asset and a much-needed conservative leader in Muskogee County government. 

Muskogee City Council, County Commissioners adopt shelter-in-place resolution

The Muskogee City Council and County Commissioners held an historic joint emergency meeting this evening, where they unanimously voted to adopt "a task force's recommendation that directs Muskogee County residents to 'stay at home and avoid unnecessary travel.'"

During the meeting, health officials said that Muskogee County now has 4 confirmed COVID-19 cases, up from 1 yesterday.

Details on adopted Joint City-County Task Force recommendations:

• Residents of the City and County are directed to stay at home and avoid discretionary travel unless they are performing essential activities.
• Essential activities include health-related appointments, purchasing food/home goods, outdoor activity under social distancing guidelines, as well as work at an essential business as defined by Gov. Stitt's executive orders
• Not a curfew
• No plan to stop residents and ask why they are not home
• Requires essential businesses to set controls within their operations to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 (i.e. work from home, social distancing, etc)
• Echoes Gov. Stitt's order to close non-essential business

You can read the full resolution here.

Afterwards, Mayor Janey Boydston and District Attorney Orvil Loge addressed Muskogee city/county residents about the meeting:

First COVID-19 case in Muskogee County (UPDATE: not currently living here)

From Muskogee County Commissioner Ken Doke:

UPDATED INFORMATION ON MUSKOGEE COUNTY COVID19 CASE

After being notified by the Health Department that the first positive case in Muskogee County was confirmed, further investigation revealed that this person is not currently living in Muskogee County. Current policy for case reporting is to report confirmed cases to the county where the person resides. If this case does end up being reported as a case in Muskogee County, please know that it would only be a technicality because this person is not currently living in Muskogee County at this time. The case is still under investigation. If there is any other relevant information that becomes available, we will let you know. Thanks.

The Muskogee City Council declared a state of emergency yesterday during a specially-called meeting, following similar moves by other Oklahoma cities this week.

I will post updates as more details emerge.

Landfill vouchers available for Muskogee County flood debris removal

Muskogee County Commissioner Ken Doke posted yesterday that the County has negotiated discounts with the Muskogee County Landfill for those affected by the recent flooding:



Multiple relief organizations are working in Muskogee County helping flood victims with mudouts, demolition and debris removal. Here is some information passed along by Clean Pro, a cleaning and water damage restoration company in Muskogee:

click here for full size

End in sight? Arkansas River appears to have crested at Muskogee

As historic flooding continues to affect northeastern and east-central Oklahoma, the Army Corps of Engineers appears to be cautiously optimistic about the reduction in flooding in the Arkansas River at Muskogee.

From the Tulsa World:

“Right now, on our current path, we expect the river to be back within its banks at Muskogee around June 8, barring any additional significant weather,” [Tulsa District U.S. Army Corps of Engineers spokesman Preston Chasteen] said.

Releases from Keystone Lake are being bumped up from 250,000 cubic feet per second to 275,000 cfs by Monday morning. That will result in slightly higher flood levels in the Tulsa area. However, for residents in Muskogee and further south, discharge from the Grand River at Fort Gibson Lake has reduced from 211,000 cfs at midnight last night to 177,000 cfs at 6pm Sunday, which will result in an almost even swap with the increase from Keystone.

According to Muskogee County Commissioner Ken Doke, "the Corps intends to stagger the flows at other dams to keep this a net-neutral flow for our area [Muskogee, Fort Gibson, Braggs, Webbers Falls]."

Information from the Corps of Engineers appears to show that the Arkansas River crested, at least temporarily, at 46.39' at 9:00am this morning, and has fallen slightly to 46.21' as of 7pm. That is the same level the river was at at midnight. This is the first stretch of falling water levels since this flooding event began.

While forecasts are calling for more storms on Tuesday and Wednesday, with the potential for areas of significant rainfall, there is no rain in the forecast for Memorial Day, which will allow water levels to begin falling (even if its slowly) to hopefully compensate for any additional precipitation on Tuesday/Wednesday.

In other words, it's beginning to look like the end is in sight for flood-beleaguered communities up and down the Arkansas River!

The amount of rainfall that has occurred in the Arkansas River watershed is staggering, as shown in the above map from Oklahoma Mesonet. Everything that fell in area 'A' runs through the Three Forks at Muskogee, the confluence of the Arkansas, Verdigris, and Grand rivers.

It will still take plenty of time for inundated areas to become accessible for residents, restoration professionals, and volunteers. Due to the extreme contamination found in floodwaters, much of what has been affected by water damage in homes and businesses will need to be disposed of.

It is vitally important for health and safety that proper steps are taken when dealing with the aftermath of a house flooded by an incident such as this. Make sure that you work with restoration companies that have the proper training, equipment, and insurance to handle this type of work.

It is advisable to go ahead and call a water damage restoration company now in order to get on their list of jobs. Waiting until the waters have fully receded may put you behind multiple other customers.

Clean Pro, the company my family runs, has been serving customers in the Muskogee area since 1987. Water damage restoration is one of the services we provide, and we are IICRC-Certified in Water Damage Restoration. You can reach us by calling 918-686-0222, emailing CleanProMuskogee@gmail.com, visiting our website, or messaging us on Facebook.

We have already had customers call to line us up for work, which is going to be the case for all of the local restoration companies. There will be plenty of work to go around, and I have already heard of out-of-area companies that plan to head to our area to work. Whoever you end up using, make sure that they are properly trained, insured, and reputable.

To reiterate some information that I've posted previously, for official road highway closures, visit OKRoads.org. This does not cover county or city streets. Some local road closures can be found on the official Facebook pages of the City of Muskogee Emergency Management and the Muskogee County Emergency Management. You can also check out this video from Clean Pro posted yesterday, showing the flooding on the north and east side of Muskogee and giving out information for area flood donation dropoffs, updates from the City and County, and tips on what to do about damage at your home or business.

Current and recent river levels can be accessed here, and forecasts for river levels can be viewed here.

Doke touts Muskogee County's first balanced budget since '09

From Muskogee County Commissioner Ken Doke (R-Dist. 1):

Yesterday marked the dawning of a new day for Muskogee County. For a number of years now, the county has been operating in the red with deficit budgets. In fact, between 2010 and 2015, the county spent $2,252,441 more than it brought in revenue. Beginning in 2015, the board of county commissioners set out to fix this problem. We began creating new policies and committed to fixing the county's budget woes.

In 2016, commissioners passed a balanced budget that was designed to end deficit spending. For the first time in years, we finished the year with no RED numbers. In fact, Muskogee County ended the year with a surplus balance of $1.2 Million. With a $1.2 Million carry-over balance, we were able to start this NEW fiscal year with the largest budget in Muskogee County history.

Having better managed our funds, we found ourselves in a position to do some things that were long overdue. We are going to put a new roof and replace the HVAC at the courthouse. We are going to be able to pay for these enormous costs out of our budget rather than asking for tax payers to pass a bond. We plan to help Sheriff Rob Frazier purchase new patrol cars. We set aside funds for District Attorney, Orvil Loge to hire a civil attorney to help with his case load for the next year. We allocated monies to the volunteers of the Sheriff's patrol so that they could purchase new equipment.

The OSU Extension had suffered severe state budget cuts, and was at risk of having to cut staff and programs to our area youth. Muskogee County was able to step up and provide the needed funding to keep that agency alive, and continue providing agricultural training and programs to students throughout Muskogee County.

I would like to say thank you to the rest of our commissioner board and to our elected officials throughout the county who bought into the vision; came together; and made the necessary sacrifices to put the county back on the road to success. It is nice to be looking ahead and proactively fixing our problems now compared to where we were just a year or two ago.

Note: In 2014, Doke became the first Republican to be elected as a County Commissioner in Muskogee County. Balancing the budget has been one of the things he's pushed for while in office, and I believe this wouldn't have happened without his efforts.

Big night for Muskogee County GOP

Not only was tonight's election a big night for the OKGOP, it was a huge night for the Muskogee County GOP.

In House District 14, George Faught defeated Jack Reavis 4,469 votes (56.8%) to 3,399 (43.2%) -- the biggest margin achieved by a Republican in that district. In 2006, Faught became the first Republican to win HD14, holding it for three terms, and Republican Arthur Hulbert held the seat this past term.

In the race for District 1 County Commissioner, Ken Doke defeated Speck Plunkett 3,375 votes (53.0%) to 2,992 (47.0%). As far as is know, Doke becomes the first Republican to hold a seat on the county commission.

State Senator Kim David easily retained SD18, with 68.7% district-wide and 62.3% in the Muskogee County portion of the district.

Roger Thompson took SD8 from the Democrats, with 55.9% district-wide, and 53.9% in the Muskogee County portion.

Statewide Republican candidates had a mixed bag in Muskogee County. Mary Fallin got 47.6% to Joe Dorman's 49.1%, Todd Lamb took 60.5%, Joy Hofmeister received 44.0%, Mark Costello eeked out 50.1%, Jim Inhofe got 60.3%, James Lankford took 59.9%, and Markwayne Mullin received 64.4%.

Primary Election: My Take

Due to recent family events, I have been unable to blog much in the last week or so about the primary election, coming up tomorrow (Tuesday the 24th). This post will briefly cover some of my picks -- although not as thorough as I might have done were circumstances different.

U.S. Senate (unexpired term): James Lankford
Either way, we will have a conservative Senator replacing Tom Coburn. However, while I disagree with some of Lankford's votes, I have fewer reservations with him than I do with Shannon. Brogdon is a total non-factor, and has a bad habit of exhibiting poor judgement (i.e. when he got into the governor's race on Christmas, then switched to Senate, etc).
U.S. House, District 2: Darrel Robertson
U.S. House, District 5: Steve Russell
Governor: Dax Ewbank
I have been very disappointed with Fallin as governor, and will be casting a protest vote for Ewbank.
State Superintendent: ???
I am still undecided in this race. Barresi has alienated many conservatives while in office, but at the same time others are wary of Hofmeister's connections. I'm open to be convinced.
Insurance Commissioner: John Doak
Corporation Commissioner: Todd Hiett
Muskogee County Commissioner, District 1: Ken Doke
It's a shame that Muskogee County Republicans have a primary in this race, and both Ken and Mike Stewart would be great county commissioners. However, I think Ken has the best chance at winning this heavily Democratic seat, and will bring a different, more conservative approach to the office.
Rogers County Treasurer: Jason Carini
Jason is a good friend of mine, and threw his hat into the ring when nobody else would do something about the problems at the Rogers County Treasurer's office. Here's a good synopsis on BatesLine.

Michael Bates has a good post on his take, although he and I differ on a few races. Read his here.

Doke and Stewart in Muskogee County Commission GOP primary

Ken Doke                                           Mike Stewart

Muskogee County Commission District 1 has an interesting phenomenon taking place this June -- a GOP primary.  Republicans Ken Doke and Mike Stewart both filed their candidacy last week for the open county commission seat. Three Democrats also filed: Bob Burgess, Steve Goad, and Speck Plunkett.

Doke is an area businessman, while Stewart has been the City of Muskogee's Public Works Director since 2000, after working in various sanitation and streets functions since 1977.

Muskogee County rarely has Republican primaries for any office, and it has been years since any GOP primary took place for a county-level office. Only about 25% of Muskogee County voters are registered Republican.

Muskogee County GOP awards scholarships

Local Students Receive Scholarships from County GOP

Congratulations are in order to three area students who were recently awarded $500 scholarships by the Muskogee County Republican Party.

"The scholarship recipients were chosen based on their involvement in the community and local schools", said Ken Doke, one of the scholarship committee members. "We also took into consideration their GPA, future plans, and their knowledge of the current political climate," said Doke.

Scholarships were awarded to the following students, and can be used at the college or university of their choice.

• Ashley Curran - Hilldale High School
• John Trey Bennan - Muskogee High School
• John Cody Kilgore - Fort Gibson High School

The Muskogee County Republican Party annually awards scholarships to high school seniors within Muskogee County.