This lobby group which also holds a contract to maintain the area, would open the mall to automobile traffic and remove the Bartlett Square fountain. Norton says there would be a new smaller fountain at 4th and Main and one at 5th and Main honoring Governor Bartlett. DTU s plan is to close the street between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. so lunchtime pedestrians will not be disturbed by traffic. Voters as a part of the 1996 third penny sales tax election approved the 1.15 million-dollar budget. Because no specific plans were named in the election, city officials are free to pick the plan public or special interest groups support.
All sides claim to support the best interest of a growing vibrant downtown business community.
The Save the Mall Committee has been circulating petitions for months and will submit them to the City Council at this next meeting December 10, at 6 p.m. Then Tulsa could be twenty years and millions of dollars ahead of other cities. Three years after construction, DTU came again to City Government asking for money because they could not afford the maintenance. Taxpayers have footed the maintenance bill ever since. Now, nine months after losing the so-called Tulsa Project by over 61 percent of the popular vote, DTU comes again for more tax money.