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Kevin Harvison
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Motorists love lower price
“I love it!” Dawnya Doney, of McAlester, said of the $1.98 price per gallon for the gas she was pumping into her car Monday.
The rate, at Murphy USA, was the among the lowest in the country as fuel prices fell throughout the state. A number of other stations in town followed suit, dropping below the $2 mark for the first time in months.
“It’s probably been, what, well over a year since it’s been near this low?” said Taylor Terrell, of Savanna. She planned on getting $30 worth of gas and thought it might even fill her tank. “It’s been a long time since I’ve done that,” she said of filling up for less than $30.
“We have not seen prices this low for many moons,” said Chuck Mai, spokesman for AAA Oklahoma, noting the average for gas across the state Monday was $2.074, just ahead of Missouri at $2.078. Kansas followed at $2.129.
“We have the lowest statewide gas price average of all the 50 states,” Mai said Monday afternoon. “Oklahoma is the absolutely lowest.”
He attributed the state’s enviable position to several factors: Oklahoma has five refineries and is near even more in the Gulf; the state gas tax of 17 cents is among the lowest in the country — the national average is about 28 cents; and a level of competition among distributors. “We have quite a few gas stations out there competing for our gas dollar,” Mai said. “We have more stations per capita than other places in the country.”
Whatever the cause, several drivers were taking advantage at the Kum and Go station on Wyandotte Avenue where gas was $1.99 per gallon. Contractor Vince Serra of St. Louis filled his SUV, which was pulling a trailer, another large pickup truck and what appeared to be a skid loader driven off a nearby trailer.
Darren Flournoy, of Clayton, was in town for a doctor’s visit and planned to pump $20 worth of gas into his pickup truck before heading home, where gas cost $2.59. Twenty dollars, he noted, doesn’t stretch very far lately.
The gas prices are among the lowest in almost four years. According to gasbuddy.com, the average national price per gallon first hit $3 in September of 2005 — it was back down to around $2 by December — peaking last July at around $4. The Web site indicates the lowest national rate over the last four years was about $1.74 in December 2004, with rates climbing over $2 shortly afterwards.
Oklahoma average rates generally have been lower than national rates, with trends closely mirroring those around the rest of the country. The lowest average state rate in recent months was in January 2007 when gas was $1.80, according to the Web site.
Patsy Parent, of Kiowa, said the price on Wyandotte was about a quarter less than in Kiowa as she pumped as much as her Nissan Maxima would take.
“I look for it to up around Thanksgiving,” she predicted.
Mai said it was hard to determine when the price at the pump might change, given such variables as sabotage of foreign oil facilities or even an escalation of tension in the Middle East. The price, he said, is closely linked to the price of crude oil, now at around $65 per barrel.
“Unless something bad happens, I mean a negative headline that would affect supply or distribution of product, I would expect prices to continue on the path they’re taking, as long as crude oil stays in the mid-60s where it is now.”
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