Josh Lock
Candidate for Bartlesville Ward 3
Bio
Josh is a fourth-generation Oklahoman. He grew up in Broken Arrow and attended the University of Arkansas, where he met Anne during his first week of college.
Throughout college, they were involved with Campus Crusade for Christ both on campus and as far away as Thailand. Anne spent a year on staff before they got married.
They have three children: Wade, Charlotte, and Lucas.
Josh took a full-time role with what was then ConocoPhillips in 2009. He has held a variety of roles in IT and Midstream for the last 17 years, all in Bartlesville—by choice.
Today, Josh is Senior Advisor, Commercial Analytics, for Phillips 66.
He is passionate about limited government, economics, finance, and monetary history.
Josh serves as Board President for Cornerstone Classical Academy, a hybrid-homeschool in Bartlesville.
In his free time, he enjoys turf management in terrible Circle Mountain soil and mountaineering.
1. Why are you running
Why are you running for Bartlesville City Council, and what experience or perspective do you believe you would bring to the council?
I have been attending city council meetings fairly consistently for the last two years. What got me involved was the installation of roadway AI surveillance in the fall of 2024.
I started digging into how the cameras were approved, why there was no public notification or discussion, and what I could do to educate local leaders and the public about why they are such an enormous problem.
What I discovered was that the oversight failures that led to their installation were not a one-time mistake—they were a fairly consistent feature of the existing city council majority.
I tried meeting with every member of the city council. All of them spoke with me one-on-one except the Mayor, who also happened to be my own city councilor.
That bothered me greatly—especially since this was a topic I deeply understood as a corporate data professional, and I was bringing information to the table well beyond Flock’s sales talking points.
In the months and years that followed, the council was given numerous off-ramps. There were plenty of opportunities to recognize that installing these cameras had been a mistake.
Yet as time passed—and even as the national conversation caught up to what I had been explaining two years earlier—they continued to double down.
That culminated in the August 3 vote to not only extend the Flock contract but simultaneously add a second roadway AI surveillance vendor.
I was compelled to take action. My platform is straightforward: protect our liberty with my oath to the Constitution, restore the council to its proper place of authority in city government, and put the taxpayer first in every decision.
A healthy city council does not simply give the city everything it wants every month. It expects city officials to work hard to earn its votes—and to feel great when they do because they will know they actually earned it.
2. Your top priorities
What are the three most important issues facing Bartlesville during the next five years? What specific actions should the City Council take to address them?
The top three issues facing Bartlesville are: declining employment and corporate engagement from ConocoPhillips and Phillips 66, a lack of long-term employment alternatives to our historic main employers, and poor marketing of city amenities and quality of life to potential employers.
We are not going to stop encouraging ConocoPhillips and Phillips 66 to keep investing in talent and assets here—we must—but unfortunately, we have to acknowledge the data as it stands
Neither is doing much to change the current trajectory of their workforces here or their long-term commitment to a growing Bartlesville.
I will be the absolute first to celebrate when something changes on that front, but I’m also pragmatic.
The most logical goal for the city must be to attract a notable medium-sized employer that knows small-town culture, has employees already wise enough to value our way of life, and wants to enjoy the luxuries of everything above while also having a five-minute drive from office to airport.
This is an achievable goal.
To make this happen, a few things need to be addressed.
We should ask a downtown employer with the top half of its building completely empty if they are open to leasing their space to prospective employers.
We must market the airport as a world-class luxury that other medium-sized employers could only dream of having, and we must completely reimagine the commuting experience between downtown and the airport.
We cannot bring prospective employers here, greet them at the airport, drive them five minutes down Frank Phillips Boulevard to downtown, and have them scratching their heads the whole time wondering why our front door looks neglected.
While many of us may not think of Frank Phillips as our front door, any prospective employer who would love an airport-to-office commute like ours most certainly would.
A few years ago, a significant investment was made to widen and beautify Hillcrest. We need a goal to accomplish something of this magnitude on Frank Phillips all the way from Keeler to the airport.
Let’s make it a road worthy of the man for whom it is named.
If ConocoPhillips and Phillips 66 are not going to demonstrate new investment in people and resources here, let’s make what we offer so compelling that jealousy wells up in them and they reconsider their ways.
3. Endeavor 2045
Bartlesville adopted the Endeavor 2045 comprehensive plan following a community planning process. Which parts of the plan should receive the highest priority during your term, and are there portions you believe should be changed, delayed or reconsidered?
I am not overly thrilled with the plan.
We spent tens of thousands of dollars on a work product a handful of consultants spit out after just regurgitating what was largely the same cookie-cutter ideas and top-down engineering applied to the prior twenty cities who asked them to make the same thing.
Very little is novel or inspiring about it, and we would be better suited to address first the big-picture objectives I talked about in Question 2.
These are far more pressing than how many apartments and bike lanes we will have in 2045.
4. Jobs and economic development
Bartlesville has long depended on major employers including Phillips 66 and ConocoPhillips. What should the city do to diversify the local economy, attract employers and create or retain well-paying jobs? What role should the Bartlesville Development Authority and Chamber of Commerce play?
I explained what I think needs to happen with respect to employment and big-picture economic development already.
Generally, I do not support corporate welfare.
The bar for economic development with taxpayer funds is extremely high.
All city spending—incentive-focused or otherwise—must always be assessed first by remembering the guaranteed economic impact to the taxpaying, productive real economy required to fund whatever theoretical endeavors may or may not actually occur with the taxpayer’s money.
See also Price Tower results.
5. City spending and taxes
When balancing the city budget, where do you believe Bartlesville should spend more, spend less or maintain current spending? Are there city services or programs you would eliminate or significantly reduce?
The most truthful and logical way to price every dollar the city wishes to spend is as follows: Recent sales-tax collections have ranged from roughly $22 to $23.5 million annually (plus several million more in use tax from online and out-of-state purchases).
At the City’s 3.4% rate, that implies approximately $650–$690 million in annual taxable sales activity. In other words, every $1 the City collects and spends required approximately $29–$30 of local economic activity to generate ($1 ÷ 0.034 ≈ $29.41).
For every dollar we vote on, the real cost to the local economy was $29–$30 of value creation—representing the tangible risks, stress, and sweat equity of our local businesses.
That is why, when government spends money, the bar for justification must be extremely high.
The city budget is not a piggy bank we simply get to empty each year.
Respect for our citizens begins with recognizing that the money was never ours to begin with.
Our highest calling, therefore, is to exert the least possible force on the voluntary local economy—this is what pulls the wagon. The city manager, their staff, and all of the city’s grandest ambitions must never forget that they are riding in the wagon.
As your city councilor, I am committed to continually reminding my colleagues, city staff, and anyone seeking my vote that every dollar must be fully justified in light of the roughly $30 of economic force required to take it.
You will often hear me discuss the cost of a proposed project or contract not in its nominal dollar amount, but in its real economic cost as explained above.
This is the standard of stewardship you deserve.
6. Public safety cameras and privacy
What is your position on Bartlesville's use of automated license plate reader cameras? How should the city balance law enforcement benefits with residents' concerns about privacy, data retention and government surveillance?
I will remove all roadway AI surveillance devices from your roads.
You are Americans, and you will not be warrantlessly surveilled as you move about your daily lives having committed no crime.
The standard of individual liberty you can expect from me will never be, “but the courts haven’t told us they’re illegal yet.”
Your local law enforcement will protect the community and investigate crime with the same fervor they did before 2024 without roadway AI surveillance.
If you believe, as I do, that Bartlesville Police Department was doing a fantastic job for our community before 2024 without this intrusive technology, that is what you can expect moving forward.
7. City manager and council roles
What do you believe is the proper relationship between the City Council and city manager? Where should council oversight end and the city manager's authority over day-to-day operations begin?
The city manager’s day-to-day role as what is essentially the CEO of the city—I have zero problem with.
However, the level of respect, direction, and vision casting about the future will change.
You should expect that your city council is at all times actually the ones driving the bus, rather than being mere passengers just happy to have a seat and a ticket to social or political status.
For more information about the candidate, please find the links below
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