Oklahoma City Council seeks control over disclosure rules on election spending

The burden of the district attorney is to enforce the current law, which Oklahoma County's David Prater said is almost unenforceable and probably unconstitutional.

The state Ethics Commission agrees and implored the Legislature to scrap it but also recommended giving enforcement authority for a new law to district attorneys like Prater who don't want it.

Members of the Oklahoma City Council plan to ask the Legislature to clean up the mess by giving cities and counties the power to regulate their own election spending disclosure rules.

Councilmen Pete White and Ed Shadid are leading the charge in Oklahoma City to ask lawmakers to overhaul the state law governing local elections or write a new one. Mayor Mick Cornett, Councilman Pat Ryan and Councilwoman Meg Salyer also have publicly voiced support for exploring how the city can gain control over election spending disclosure rules.

“We clearly are deserving of oversight of our elections,” Shadid said.