DHS Gets $23M Bond Nod

The Oklahoma Council of Bond Oversight approved a request last week by the state Department of Human Services to issue up to $23 million of revenue bonds for projects in Tulsa, Ada, and Sapulpa. The Oklahoma Development Finance Authority will issue the 15-year revenue bonds. The agency will lease the buildings to DHS until the bonds mature, when ownership will transfer to the department. DHS will replace an outdated and overcrowded emergency children’s shelter in Tulsa that was built in the 1940s. It will cost about $6.4 million to replace the facility with three cottages containing 42 beds and eight cribs, and an administrative building on about 20 acres in northeast Tulsa. Other projects include $6.3 million to buy and renovate a 33-year-old, five-story office building to house state employees being displaced from a downtown Tulsa office building, $4.5 million to build an office building in Ada to serve Pontotoc County, and $4.4 million for a new office building in Sapulpa.