Bubbaworld

Tulsa County Commissioners Randi Miller and John Smaligo teamed up with other members of the Tulsa County Public Facilities Authority to toss Rick Bjorklund under the bus this morning, possibly in an attempt to save their political careers.

The Tulsa County Public Facilities Authority, with Commissioner Smaligo leading the charge, today fired Expo Square President Rick Bjorklund. No surprise there, after all I predicted that just yesterday.

They also suspended Expo Square’s comptroller Preston Jackson for two weeks without pay.

This as the Tulsa County Commissioners try to shift blame from themselves onto anyone below them in the county’s pecking order and honestly there is plenty of blame to go around.

Sure, Bjorklund should have been fired and Preston Jackson should have been fired right along with him as should have been the entire management and accounting team at Expo Square, aka the Tulsa Fairgrounds.

Anyone and everyone that knew of the owners of Big Splash Water Park failing to pay the rent due the Fairgrounds and who did nothing about it should not only be fired, but also investigated by a grand jury for possible criminal offenses.

And the same goes for every member of the Tulsa County Public Facilities Authority which supposedly has oversight of Expo Square management and operations and which was apparently asleep at the wheel while Big Splash escaped paying half of its rent for 2006 and all of its rent from 2007.

Tulsa County Commissioners Randi Miller and John Smaligo received nice big juicy $5,000 campaign contributions from the owner of Big Splash during the 2006 election cycle. Whether all that money led to “blindness” on the part of the commissioners is a question only they can answer. Supposedly Smaligo has returned the money and Randi Miller - she says the money has been spent, so evidently that’s that from the Miller camp.

Another interesting aspect of the current scandal has surfaced involving that “held check” for $68,000.

The rent which Big Splash is “supposed” to pay to the Tulsa Fairgrounds is due October 15th of each year. It turns out that the check for $68,000, representing half the rent Big Splash owed Expo Square for 2006 and which was “held” for so long was actually dated June 1, 2007.

This means that the check was 7 1/2 months or so late at the time it was written.

The check was then held by Fairgrounds management until last Friday at which time it was cashed, which is a miracle in and of itself as anyone that has ever tried to cash a “stale” check would know.

This means that the payment of the second half of 2006 was delayed for about 19 1/2 months.

Don’t we all wish that we could get our creditors to “hold” our payments for that long? A sweetheart deal if ever there was one.

Of course this leaves one to question when, if ever, the folks over at Big Splash are going to pay their rent for last year or for that matter, their rent for this year.

After all, the rent for last year is only about 8 and a half months late and the Murphys are apparently used to getting far more preferred treatment than that.

Now…

Maybe Randi Miller will explain to me how Bell’s was not financially viable, although they always paid their rent and Big Splach is financially viable and seems to have a problem paying the rent.

Isn’t that sorta back-asswards there Randi?

Shouldn’t Big Splash have been run off and Bell’s permitted to stay?

After all, Bell’s did pay their rent.

Of course the Bell family probably didn’t contribute much if anything to Randi Miller’s campaign fund either…