The U.S. Department of the Treasury announced today that four additional Oklahoma community banks received a total of $51.1 million as part of the final wave of funding provided through the Small Business Lending Fund (SBLF).

The SBLF, which was established as part of the Small Business Jobs Act that President Obama signed into law, encourages community banks to increase their lending to small businesses, helping those companies expand their operations and create new jobs.

The Oklahoma community banks receiving funding as part of today’s announcement include the following.

• F & M Bancorporation, Inc. (Tulsa, OK) — $38.2 million
• Central Service Corporation (Enid, OK) — $7.0 million
• AmeriBank Holding Company (Collinsville, OK) — $5.3 million
• Citizen Potawatomi Community Development Corporation (Shawnee, OK) — $490,000

Overall, including today’s announcement, seven Oklahoma community banks received a total of $64.1 million in SBLF funding. For a full list of Oklahoma community banks that received SBLF funding, please visit link for the most recent SBLF transaction report.

“Billions of dollars in SBLF funds are now being put to use in communities all across the nation, spurring small business growth and job creation,” said Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Neal S. Wolin. “These investments, which will help propel lending by Main Street banks, are good for our economy and good for America’s small businesses.”

Small businesses play a critical role in the U.S. economy and are central to growth and job creation. Small businesses employ roughly one-half of all Americans and account for about 60 percent of gross job creation. But small business owners faced disproportionate challenges in the aftermath of the recession and credit crisis, including difficulty accessing capital.

The SBLF helps small businesses meet this challenge by providing capital to community banks that hold under $10 billion in assets. The dividend rate a community bank pays on SBLF funding is reduced as that bank increases its lending to small businesses – providing a strong incentive for new lending to small businesses so they can expand and create jobs. For more details on the SBLF program, please visit, link.

The SBLF is one part of the Obama Administration’s comprehensive agenda to help small businesses access the capital they need to invest and hire. The State Small Business Credit Initiative (SSBCI), which is also a key part of the Small Business Jobs Act, allocates $1.5 billion to new and existing state programs that will leverage private financing to spur $15 billion in new lending to small businesses and small manufacturers.

The Obama Administration has also supported 17 direct tax breaks that provide tax relief of more than $50 billion for small businesses. These tax breaks were designed to support job creation and retention, entrepreneurship, investment, and growth. The Administration has also worked with Congress to extend and expand existing Small Business Administration loan programs that helped put more than $42 billion in the hands of small businesses and deliver other important benefits to help small businesses expand and hire. 

Citing extreme weather conditions that have claimed the lives of over 500 victims this year, U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) has introduced legislation to provide taxpayers an incentive to build storm shelters in their homes.

The bill titled S. 1583, the Storm Shelter Tax Relief Act of 2011, gives
a tax deduction of up to $2,500 to American taxpayers who purchase and
install qualified storm shelters. Qualified expenses include the
purchase, construction, and installation of a storm shelter or safe room
that is capable of withstanding an EF5 tornado.

“This legislation is essential to protecting Americans across the nation from extreme weather conditions like tornadoes,” said Inhofe. “Currently, our nation offers very few resources to assist homeowners with proactively protecting their families from severe weather. This year alone, tornadoes have devastated 14 states and killed 550 people. Even more alarming is the fact that over 734 deadly tornadoes have claimed the lives of over 2,000 people since 1980.  This preventative measure is necessary to states that, like Oklahoma, are most vulnerable to severe weather.”

Inhofe continued, “This tax deduction provides a storm shelter incentive that is free from bureaucratic red tape, and its $41 million cost is paid for by the rescission of funds previously authorized for storm shelter construction grants. By exercising fiscal responsibility, this legislation still provides needed assistance for the purchase and installation of storm shelters nationwide.”

STORM SHELTER TAX RELIEF ACT

• S. 1583 offers a tax deduction of up to $2,500 to taxpayers who purchase and install qualified storm shelters.
• Currently, a small amount of funds are sporadically available through the Federal Emergency Management’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP). However, these rebates have failed to provide Americans with a continuous incentive to build a storm shelter.
• S. 1583 is paid for by rescinded funds administered by the Department of Housing and Urban Development
• The deduction can only be claimed by taxpayers who attach the storm shelter or safe room for their primary residence, which they must own.
• Storm shelters and safe room can cost between $2,000 to $10,000 dollars. Allowing taxpayers to deduct the fist $2,500 spent on a storm shelter encourages them to install at least the most basic type while still allowing them to claim the deduction if they decide that a more expensive option is best for them.

The Washington Times is reporting that FBI agents on Thursday executed search warrants at the headquarters of Solyndra LLC, which was awarded more than $500,000 in federal stimulus loans in 2009 to make solar panels in what the Obama administration called part of an aggressive effort to put more Americans to work and end U.S. dependence on foreign oil.

Solyndra is of interest locally as Argonaut Ventures, an investment arm of the Tulsa-based George Kaiser Family Foundation, holds almost 39 percent of Solyndra’s parent company, 360 Solar Degree Holdings, Inc. George Kaiser is chairman of BOK Financial Corp, owner of Kaiser-Francis Oil Company and other local enterprises. Argonaut is managed by Steve Mitchell who once and may still serve on Solyndra’s board of directors.

Oklahoma FBI Spokesman Clay Simmonds told Tulsa Today that to his knowledge, "the Oklahoma and Tulsa FBI offices have not been engaged in this investigation to date."

Solyndra filed a bankruptcy petition Tuesday in Delaware, asking a court to bar phone, electricity and water and sewer service providers from “altering, refusing or discontinuing service,” and now is the focus of an investigation by the FBI and the Energy Department’s Office of Inspector General.

California FBI spokesman Peter Lee said he could not provide details about the investigation.

A little more than a year ago, President Obama hailed Solyndra during a tour of the company, saying it expected to hire 1,000 workers and make enough panels over the lifetime of its planned expanded facility that it would be like replacing eight coal-fired power plants.

“It’s here that companies like Solyndra are leading the way toward a brighter and more prosperous future,” Mr. Obama said.

The company’s bankruptcy petition came two years after Energy Secretary Stephen Chu and Vice President Joseph R. Biden announced approval of $535 million in federal loans to Solyndra.

“This announcement today is part of the unprecedented investment this administration is making in renewable energy and exactly what the Recovery Act is all about,” Mr. Biden said.

Instead, Solyndra, which was launched in 2005, last week shed more than 900 full-time employees, leaving just a “core group” of 113 employees, according to bankruptcy records. The price for solar panels has dropped by more than 40 percent, in part because of heavy competition from Chinese companies.

Republicans have been looking into the Solyndra loan for several months and has subpoenaed documents concerning it from the White House Office of Management and Budget.

Rep. Cliff Stearns, Florida Republican and chairman of the subcommittee for oversight and investigations on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said last week the company’s collapse should raise concerns about the entire stimulus program.

“The administration celebrated Solyndra as the first recipient of its loan guarantee program and intended to showcase its success as representative of its stimulus program,” Mr. Stearns said. “This should be of great concern to all Americans considering the $1 trillion committed by the White House to its stimulus efforts.”

Mr. Stearns and Rep. Fred Upton, Michigan Republican and chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, sent a letter last week to the White House seeking information about the White House’s role in the loans to Solyndra.

In the letter, Mr. Stearns and Mr. Upton said they’ve learned from an investigation they had previously been conducting that Department of Energy officials, as well as officials from the Office of Management and Budget, were aware of White House interest in the Solyndra loan deal. In addition, they said they were aware that a major investor in Solyndra, George Kaiser, was a bundler for Mr. Obama’s campaign.

“Now with the collapse of Solyndra, we see 1,100 employees out of work and taxpayers out of $535 million, most likely,” Mr. Stearns said in a statement.

To read more, click here for The Washington Times story.

Are you ready for a disaster?  The time to prepare is right now. That’s the message the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is working to get out to people in Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas during September, which is National Preparedness Month (NPM).

"This is a season when many of us will reflect upon past disasters such as the 9/11 terrorist attacks and Hurricane Katrina," said FEMA Region 6 Administrator Tony Russell. "But we must also remember to look forward and be prepared because disasters can happen anywhere at any time. 

"We strongly encourage everyone to take these crucial steps to get ready: have a plan in place, put together an emergency kit and stay informed by listening to your local and state officials," Russell added.

NPM is an annual initiative sponsored by FEMA’s Ready Campaign in
partnership with Citizen Corps and the Ad Council. The theme this year
is "A Time to Remember, A Time to Prepare." 

Tools and resources are available in English and Spanish to help people prepare for, respond to and recover from any type of disaster. Visit the Ready Campaign’s websites, ready.gov and listo.gov, or call these toll-free numbers, 1-800-BE-READY and 1-888-SE-LISTO, for more information.

FEMA’s mission is to support our citizens and first responders to ensure that as a nation we work together to build, sustain, and improve our capability to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate all hazards. 

The same week the Obama Administration announced it was making an effort to scale back burdensome rules on small businesses, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the federal government’s labor union advocate, demonstrated an unprecedented overreach of its authority.

The NLRB issued a punitive new rule requiring all private-sector employers to post a notice in their business informing
employees of their rights under the National Labor Relations Act.

“This is a cynical move that puts politics above the best interests of Oklahoma’s small businesses and the people who work for them,” said Jerrod Shouse, state director of the National Federation of Independent Business, Oklahoma’s leading small-business association.

“All this does is create one more uncertainty for small business owners at a time when we’re trying to create jobs and get our economy back on track,” Shouse said.
 
“Just when we thought we had seen it all from the NLRB, it has reached a new low in its zeal to punish small-business owners,” said Karen Harned, executive director of NFIB’s Small Business Legal Center. “Not only is the Board blatantly moving beyond its legal authority by issuing this rule, it is unabashedly showing its spite for job creators by setting up a trap for millions of businesses.”
 
Under the National Labor Relations Act, the NLRB does not have the authority to broadly impose rules, such as the one issued today. The statute only permits the Board to act when a representation petition or unfair labor practice charge is filed.   Furthermore, the rule sets up a “gotcha” situation for millions of businesses who are unaware of the new rule or unable to immediately comply.
 
The NFIB submitted a statement opposing the rule during a public comment period in February. The comments can be found by clicking on this link.