Jamilah Nasheed Archives

Subject of expansion divides Senate panel on Medicaid reform

November 14, 2013 By Mike Lear

The work of the Senate Interim Committee on Medicaid Reform and Expansion has ended with its minority members breaking away to write their own report on its findings. This comes after the Republican majority led a vote to reject recommendations regarding eligibility expansion over Democrat objections.

The Committee discussed a draft report with 16 bullet point recommendations. Senator Jamilah Nasheed (D-St. Louis) asked Committee Chairman Gary Romine (R-Farmington) why expansion was not among them.

He told her, “Because it was not under the purview or the auspices of this committee’s responsibility.”

Romine elaborated, telling Nasheed the committee was charged with looking for ways to make Medicaid more efficient before expansion can advance. “If we get this accomplished, then any other legislation that’s presented will have a better fighting chance … but until we reform and transform the current Medicaid program, no one’s in a position that they feel confident expanding anything to any additional eligibility.”

Democrats objected, noting that a great deal of testimony taken by the Committee dealt with expansion. Romine notes that testimony is included in the report, but Nasheed and her fellow Democrats were not satisfied. They pushed for the Committee to discuss expansion issues first, and when it did not, they walked out.

“I’ll come back when we’re ready to deal with Medicaid expansion,” she told Romine, and walked out joined by Senators Paul LeVota (D-Kansas City) and Joseph Keaveny (D-St. Louis).

The three returned with their own recommendations and asked the committee to vote to include them. Those included stating that “the majority of testimony” to the committee said that the state should expand Medicaid and accept federal money for doing so, that the General Assembly should consider waiver options for expansion, acknowledging Office of Budget and Planning estimates that the state would realize General Revenue savings under expansion and the findings of a Kaiser Commission report that says states not expanding Medicaid expect a larger increase in their state budget portions going to Medicaid compared to those moving forward with expansion.

Those recommendations were rejected.

Senator Rob Schaaf (R-St. Joseph) then recommended the committee include tort reform in the report.

“One of the big drivers of healthcare is defensive medicine,” Schaaf said. “It’s been estimated that as much as twenty percent of the cost of healthcare is as a result of lawsuits, so I would ask that tort reform be included in the report to lower the cost of healthcare overall.”

Schaaf’s proposal earned derision from LeVota.

“Based on our charge and based on the fact that we just rejected the biggest cost-saving thing is ridiculous,” LeVota said. “The integrity of this committee, which I think is already gone because we’re not dealing with the number one thing, but adding this in there would be … talk about a waste of time.”

The Democrats on the Committee said they would write their own minority report that will include recommendations regarding eligibility expansion.

Asked whether he thought the impasse in the committee was a sign of things to come if Medicaid expansion reaches the Senate floor in the 2014 session, LeVota expressed optimism.

“I’m going to continue to have hope that the common sense of this will be overwhelming and we’ll be on the path to do what other states did and look at this opportunity, and create it our own way.”

Recommendations the committee did put in its report to transform Medicaid include putting low-income parents, children and pregnant women on Medicaid into private managed care plans. It estimates managed care could save the state between $14 million and $15 million dollars annually.

It also recommends raising the asset limit for the elderly and disabled from $999 for a single person and $2000 for a couple to $2000 for a single person and $3000 for a couple, adding dental care for adults and encouraging health savings accounts to be used for deductibles and copays.

The Senate Committee will join its House counterpart on November 26 in a joint session with Governor Jay Nixon.

Lawmakers split on significance of school intervention bill

May 23, 2013 By Mike Lear

Lawmakers disagree on how much impact an education bill that has been sent to the Governor will have.

House Speaker Tim Jones included the passage of SB 125 as one of the successes this session under his “Triple E” agenda. (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

The bill would lift the current two-year wait for the state to intervene in a school district that has become unaccredited. It would let the state replace the failed district’s school board, or allow it to keep operating under new rules and conditions.

The lack of a clause to make it effective before August 28 could mean it will have little impact in Kansas City, where public schools have been unaccredited since January 1, 2012. Since then the Normandy School District in St. Louis County has also become unaccredited.

Other provisions would let teachers in St. Louis be removed for incompetence 30 days after being notified of an accusation of incompetence or inefficiency and would repeal a last in, first out provision for removal of non-certificated teachers in metropolitan districts.

Representative Jay Barnes (R-Jefferson City) carried the bill in the House. He says it gives the state some flexibility in how it responds to a failing district.

“You might have a situation where a school district is struggling but they don’t necessarily need that full-fledged intervention. The state board can decide to do an arm’s length intervention and help them get around the corner. At the same time we put a backstop in place that says if that struggling district is still unaccredited after three years, the state board has to come in.”

Some lawmakers are unimpressed, however. House Minority Leader Jake Hummel (D-St. Louis) noted that its passage followed two failures by the House to pass education reform legislation.

“Interesting that the majority party didn’t want to let us participate in education reform until their bill had died two times, and then stripped down to absolutely nothing. I don’t know if [Speaker of the House Tim Jones] is calling that education reform but I think that’s kind of a joke and we all know there was nothing left in that bill.”

House Speaker Tim Jones (R-Eureka) says was be convinced that the bill was significant by its Senate sponsor, Senator Jamilah Nasheed (D-St. Louis).

“We talked, and she said to me, ‘Tim, you helped pass significant education reform for the City of St. Louis and for Kansas City and you should be proud of that.’ It was hard to come to that conclusion because I wanted more.”

Nasheed tells reporters the bill’s passage was not about satisfying a Republican agenda. She says it does do significant things for St. Louis.

“[St. Louis Schools Superintendent] Doctor [Kelvin] Adams brought the bill to me and asked me to sponsor it because he wanted the City of St. Louis to be on the same level playing field like every other 551 school districts in the state of Missouri. He shouldn’t have to wait 90 days to get rid of a bad teacher.”

One of the failed House votes on education had been on the addition of principal evaluations to that bill. During that debate, Representative Steve Webb (D-Florissant) gave an impassioned speech urging the legislature to act to pass meaningful reforms. He says he supported the bill that was finally sent to the Governor, but says it leaves a lot to be done.

“It was important for St. Louis City and the Kansas City areas. It still doesn’t address the overall need because those aren’t the only school districts in the state that are having problems … I still believe we missed the mark this year when it comes to education.”

Governor Jay Nixon has not yet acted on that proposal.

Lawmakers’ discussion of Medicaid could carry into legislative break

May 20, 2013 By Mike Lear

Representative Jay Barnes speaks on the House floor on SB 125 while it's Senate sponsor, Senator Jamilah Nasheed, looks on. Barnes handled her bill in the House. (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Representative Jay Barnes (foreground, on mic) and Senator Jamilah Nasheed carried proposals for a joint interim committee on Medicaid reform in their respective chambers. (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

The discussion of the future of Medicaid in Missouri has likely not ended with the close of the legislative session. The General Assembly has approved legislation that would create at House-Senate Committee to study Medicaid reform in the interim.

The idea was proposed in the House by Representative Jay Barnes (R-Jefferson City), who told his fellows, “It’s now my hope that we can form a joint interim committee to work together with leaders on this issue from the Missouri Senate. I think that there’s an interest in there in exploring paths forward.”

The proposal was carried in the Senate by Senator Jamilah Nasheed (D-St. Louis), who criticized Republicans as opposing Medicaid expansion out of “hatred for President Obama.” She called the idea of an interim committee a “light at the end of the tunnel.”

She says, “Hopefully we can get this past the finish line next year.”

House Minority Leader Jake Hummel (D-St. Louis) says his caucus will participate in that committee, but says the Republican majority already knows what needs to be done.

“I think that’s just a way for them to kick the ball down the field. They’re just going to try and push it off ’til next session, but Missouri can’t wait for next session. We absolutely failed … it was the single most important issue of this session.”

The interim committee proposal was passed out of the legislature on Friday before the end of the session. Governor Jay Nixon (D) must now decide how to act on it.

A second attempt at education reform fails in the House (AUDIO)

May 9, 2013 By Mike Lear

For the second time, an attempt by House leadership to pass education reform legislation has failed in a late night vote.

Representative Jay Barnes speaks on the House floor on SB 125 while its Senate sponsor, Senator Jamilah Nasheed, looks on. Barnes handled her bill in the House. (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Changes were proposed to Senate bill 125 sponsored by Senator Jamilah Nasheed (D-St. Louis City) that would lift the two-year wait before the state can intervene in a failing school district to add language to institute principal evaluations.

The plan was carried in the House by Representative Jay Barnes (R-Jefferson City), who said he would rather have offered all the provisions in SB 125.

“What I’m going to attempt to do tonight is to take a part of a bill … and we’re going to amend it down to a [principal evaluations] which I believe can and should pass this body because it got 104 votes when it was offered earlier this session as an amendment onto a bill.”

The proposal inspired impassioned comments from lawmakers including Representative Steve Webb (D-Florissant), who supported the bill.

“We’re failing. We’re failing. And while we’re talking about putting letter grades on schools, which I think we should do, let’s put a letter grade on this legislature. It’s been an ‘F.'”

Representative Vicki Englund (D-St. Louis) says the principal evaluation proposal would not have allowed school districts to do anything they can’t already.

“A lot of the things that we debate are already tools in the toolbox. It’s a matter of how the school board members choose to use them or don’t choose to use them, and there are things that make school districts different. For example, the funding level that each school district receives, in my opinion, greatly impacts the quality of the education that the children receive.”

After a close vote adopted the amendment to implement principal evaluations, the House voted down its substitute for the bill 76-82, after leaving the board open the full 30 minutes possible as supporters tried to swing votes. The Senate bill has been laid aside on the House Calendar and could be taken up again and passed in the form in which it left the Senate before the session ends next week.

The education discussion turned what had been a night of at time jovial debate by lawmakers who had just returned from a social event into a somber and tense debate.

Senator Nasheed, who had been talking to lawmakers from the side floor galleries of the House throughout the debate, left the chamber for a time after Representative Keith English (D-Florrisant) shouted at her to quit threatening people. English was a “nay” vote on the bill.

When House Majority Floor Leader John Deihl (R-Town and Country) moved for the previous question, to cut off debate and force a vote on the bill, Representative Genise Montecillo (D-St. Louis) stormed off the floor. Montecillo, often vocal on education issues, had been standing to speak throughout the debate but was not recognized to.

The House in April voted down a teacher performance evaluation proposal (see the story on that bill).

AUDIO: Hear Steve Webb’s floor remarks, 5:47

Supreme Court decisions allow Nasheed, Taylor to run in August

June 19, 2012 By Mike Lear

Two decisions handed down today by the Missouri Supreme Court clear the way for two St. Louis-area democrat state lawmakers to run in the August Primary.

Representatives Jamilah Nasheed and Sylvester Taylor II

The Court upheld the trial court ruling that Representative Sylvester Taylor II can run in the 75th House District against Representative Rochelle Walton Gray. Gray petitioned the trial court saying that Taylor was ineligible because he didn’t live in that district for one year prior to the general election. The Supreme Court’s ruling says he only has to have lived in the county or any of the districts from which the 75th was drawn during reapportionment, and Taylor meets those criteria.

See the summary and the decision on the Walton Gray petition.

The Court overturned a trial court decision barring Representative Jamilah Nasheed from running in the 5th Senate District against Senator Robin Wright-Jones and Representative Jeanette Mott Oxford. Wright-Jones had petitioned that Nasheed was not eligible because she didn’t live in the district. The Court says an exception in the Constitution that lets a candidate live in any district from which the new district was drawn in the year prior to reapportionment.

See the summary and the decision on the Wright-Jones petition.

The Court usually accepts post-motion opinions for 15 days after handing down a decision, but under the expedited nature of this case that deadline is tomorrow. Its decision is not final until it issues a mandate.

Supreme Court to consider legislative residency cases (AUDIO)

June 15, 2012 By Mike Lear

The Supreme Court will consider two cases in which Democrat state lawmakers have been told they can’t run in the districts they want to, in the August primary.

Representatives Jamilah Nasheed and Sylvester Taylor (photos courtesy, Missouri House Communications)

The Missouri Court of Appeals on Thursday ruled Black Jack Representative Sylvester Taylor can’t run in a St. Louis County District against Representative Rochelle Walton Gray because he doesn’t live there. Wednesday, it ruled that St. Louis Representative Jamilah Nasheed can’t run in a St. Louis state Senate district against Senator Robin Wright-Jones and Representative Jeanette Mott Oxford, for the same reason.

The Supreme Court this afternoon agreed to hear both cases and to expedite them.

The Court took them up “on briefs,” meaning the cases presented to the appellate court are what the Supreme Court will consider. Spokeswoman Beth Riggert says it’s an unusual move.

“On occasion, the Court will have certain types of cases that it needs to expedite, and election cases like this where there is a deadline looming, the Court will do what it can to process the case and move it forward as quickly as it is able, while still giving the parties in the case a full opportunity to be heard, which is what’s happening here. The parties have already had the opportunity to fully brief the case and argue the case, and this allows the court to move that case forward as quickly as it is able to a decision.”

The Court’s decision could be handed down at any time, and could affect more than two dozen other candidates in the state.

AUDIO: Mike Lear reports, :55