Farm Director KC Sheperd caught up with Oklahoma State Representative Ty Burns to learn his priorities for the current legislative session. He listed the mental health of Oklahomans, a bill involving the inconvenient length of trains, another to ban the sale of lab-grown meat in the state, and the third to reduce the number of virtual days to return students to more time in-person in the classrooms.
“There is a major mental health issue in Oklahoma,” he said. “That is obviously the priority for House leadership, and there are a lot of different committees coming together to look at that. Hopefully, we can get that resolved very soon.”
Rep. Burns is closely monitoring the progress of his own bills, especially House Bill 758, which deals with the number of in-person classroom days students and schools must adhere to.
“Covid allowed these virtual days to take effect, and now people are misusing them,” he stated. “This is a state issue. We are talking about the billions of dollars that we use to fund schools at the state level – that’s our job. The biggest thing is H.B. 758 did not eliminate the four-day school week; you are going to have to adjust your calendar if it does go through because virtual days will be limited to two.”
He emphasized the number of talented teachers in the state and how much better students learn in person with those teachers than on digital devices. Also, how difficult it can be for working parents to manage having their children home on virtual days and helping them with their schoolwork.
The bill to ban cultivated meat products, authored by Senator Grant Green, passed in the House and has been sent to the Senate. “One of the things that scares me about this is one of the big four learning and going out and manufacturing lab-grown meat,” he described. “Then, they are going to cut it. Right now, we have the problem with foreign beef coming in, and you have some fast food franchises that are using ¼ foreign beef, ¾ American beef, and calling it American beef. Now, they are going to do it with cultivated meat. Labeling isn’t good enough because there are always loopholes in labeling. Just get rid of it completely. God did us a favor when He created these animals that feed us the protein.”
He emphasized the importance of maintaining the culture of beef production and beef consumption in the state and the economic stability that it provides for the state.
A lot is going on at the State Capitol. Today is Veterans Day, and Sentinel resident Wayne Freeman was honored as the Veteran of the Week. Tomorrow is Ag Day at the Capitol, and next week will include AFR Day at the Capitol and Beef Day at the Capitol. Ag Day at the Capitol will be held in the 2nd Floor Rotunda from 8 am to 5 pm and is an opportunity to bring the story of agriculture to the Oklahoma legislature.
Rep. Burns first congratulated Mr. Freeman for his recognition, then described the celebratory days at the Capitol, saying, “When you start talking about Ag in Oklahoma when it comes to the Capitol, it is one of the biggest days we start talking about all of the different types of ag coming together from the cotton, soybeans, wheat to ranchers, pork and chicken producers. We have a plethora of ag industry here in the state of Oklahoma. Once you start getting everybody up here, you start seeing all of the different entities that are pushing ag and how big it really is and how big of an economic stability that it becomes in the state.”
He gave a shoutout to AFR and its day at the Capitol and touted them for beginning the Oklahoma Certified Beef Association, which will provide a beef meal for the Oklahoma Rural Caucus. “It is a great time to, not just promote beef, but Oklahoma beef, and I look forward to that day,” he said.
Sheperd brought up the value of helping urban dwellers who may not fully appreciate the agricultural industry in the state learn more about it, and Burns readily agreed. He admitted that he cringes some when he hears that Oklahoma is tenth in migration due to people hearing how great the state is and wanting to live its it’s expansive rural areas, and also industries, such as solar power utilizing acres that would otherwise be agricultural acres.
“It is a big, big concern,” he said. “Going back to cultivated meat, that was the whole Green Deal push – ‘get rid of the farting cow’ – so that is another reason to ban it. This is a whole different cultural attack on what we are in Oklahoma. There are serious different issues that you have that make everybody be aware, and hopefully, the urban areas can see that and appreciate it.
“I know on the Rural Caucus, we have several urban representatives that come in, and even on our agricultural committee, Trish Ranson, she is an urban Stillwater girl. I don’t know that she has ever truly eaten any dust, but she gets in there and pulls her sleeves up and really tries to understand the problems that we have in agriculture and in the rural communities, so I think that is awesome and that is another thing this day does.”
