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Missourinet

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You are here: Home / Archives for MOHELA

MOHELA expansion approved, goes to governor

April 28, 2008 By admin Leave a Comment

An expansion of the student loan agency is approved by the House and sent to Governor Blunt, but not before Democrats once again heap scorn upon the Blunt Administration for orchestrating the sell-off of assets from MOHELA.

MOHELA stands for the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority and for one of the most contentious issues in the legislature. Democrats have soundly criticized Republican approval of the MOHELA asset sell-off, used to pay for college capital improvements. That criticism grew louder when MOHELA disclosed earlier this year that it lost more than $12 million.

Rep. Gayle Kingery (R-Poplar Bluff) is the House sponsor of SB 967 . He dismisses talk that MOHELA is on the verge of insolvency.

"They (MOHELA) had a pretty good month last month and (they) had a profit," Kingery tells colleagues during House floor debate. He says MOHELA has been able to bring people laid off back to work and says MOHELA right now is in "pretty good shape".

The bill allows MOHELA to originate federal student loans equal to 10% of its volume last year, which would total $200 million. Originating that much in federal loans would gain MOHELA a quick two million dollar profit.

SB 967 contains an emergency clause, making it go into effect upon the governor’s signature. That would allow MOHELA to originate some federal loans for the coming school year.

Rep. Jake Zimmerman, a Democrat from Olivette, agrees it’s an emergency, but contends it is one of the Republican majority’s making.

"Now there’s a shortage of assets," Zimmerman says during House debate, "but let us not forget that the reason we need to do it right away is because of bad decisions by this governor and this (Republican) majority."

The bill goes to the governor. 

 

Download/listen Brent Martin reports (1:20 MP3)

Filed Under: Legislature, Politics / Govt Tagged With: Democratic Party, MOHELA, Republican Party

Auditor Dismisses Suit Against MOHELA Over Closed Records

December 5, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

The lawsuit brought against MOHELA – the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority – over access to closed records has been dismissed.

The suit had been filed by State Auditor Susan Montee (D-MO), who wanted the information to determine whether the MOHELA audit report that was released in October would need to be supplemented.

Auditors reviewed the closed records on Monday, determining that all required information has now been provided. So, the lawsuit has been dropped.

Filed Under: Crime / Courts Tagged With: Auditor, MOHELA

MOHELA Lawsuit Expected to Return

November 28, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

Lawyers for college students challenging Governor Matt Blunt’s plan to sell off assets from the student loan agency to pay for college construction projects say they have no intention of ending their litigation. They say the lawsuit has been dropped only so plaintiffs can re-group and expand their legal challenge.

Governor Blunt had claimed a victory with the latest action. The lawsuit claims that the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority abandoned its mission when it agreed to sell $335-Million in assets to fund the Governor’s college capital improvement plan. MOHELA has already transferred $230-Million in assets to the state.

Filed Under: Crime / Courts Tagged With: Matt Blunt, MOHELA

MOHELA Lawsuit Dismissed

November 27, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

A victory for the Blunt Administration and, in the view of Governor Matt Blunt (R-MO), a victory for Missouri students.

A class action lawsuit intended to stop the Governor’s plan to sell off $335-Million worth of assets of MOHELA – the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority – has been dismissed. Governor Blunt says he hopes what he calls a bogus lawsuit over the Lewis and Clark Discovery Initiative will be the end of the legal action against the MOHELA deal, but he can’t guarantee anything.

The plan has already seen $62-Million distributed to colleges and universities for state-of-the-art learning and research centers and other campus construction.

Download/Listen: Governor Matt Blunt reacts to lawsuit dismissal (:25 MP3)

Filed Under: Crime / Courts Tagged With: Matt Blunt, MOHELA

Blunt Likes Findings of MOHELA Audit … Kind of!

October 11, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

Governor Matt Blunt (R-MO) likes the findings of State Auditor Susan Montee’s (D-MO)  audit of MOHELA – the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority – an audit that began with Fiscal Year 2001, but he would like to have seen the audit cover a longer period of time – the past decade.

Montee’s report calls for greater oversight of MOHELA, pointing to many examples of what she considers to be excessive spending and benefits. Among the excesses: Christmas gifts were handed out, using public money. Montee also points to what she considers excessively high performance bonuses paid to executives, excessively high vacation and personal leave for executives, and a car allowance starting at $750 a month and adjusted each year.

While Blunt would like to see the an audit cover more time and actions, he does like what has been found. Blunt says this mismanagement on the part of MOHELA makes clear there is room for proposals like his Lewis and Clark Discovery Initiative, which would see about $350-Million of MOHELA assets sold to fund building projects on college campuses. This audit did not discuss the Governor’s proposal – let alone take a position on it. It focused solely on the actions of the MOHELA Board.

Download/Listen: Steve Walsh report (:60 MP3)

Filed Under: Politics / Govt Tagged With: Auditor, Matt Blunt, MOHELA

Audit Concludes MOHELA Needs More Oversight

October 11, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

State Auditor Susan Montee had promised that one of the first audits to be performed once she moved into her office would be one of MOHELA – the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority. That audit has now been completed. And, it zeroes in on practices and activities that occurred a number of years before Governor Matt Blunt (R-MO) announced his Lewis and Clark Discovery Initiative, which calls for the selling off of approximately $350-Million of MOHELA assets to fund capital improvements at Missouri’s colleges and universities.

The audit includes findings on executive severance packages and bonuses, contracts, procurement policies, and expenditures. In short, in finds MOHELA needs more oversight.

The audit points to severance benefits paid to four executives who either resigned or whose employment was terminated in recent years. Those benefits amounted to $2.3-Million, $2-Million of which the audit determines to be excessive. The audit also takes aim at annual performance bonuses paid to five MOHELA executives, including the four who also received severance packages, between fiscal year 2001 through fiscal year 2004. Those bonuses totaled almost $1.5-Million. In addition to these bonuses, the five received temporary base salary increases during the first three months of each of those periods for what was termed, "in consideration of upcoming extraordinary activities required by the Employee in the next quarter." Those increases amounted to $65,000 in FY 2001 and $82,500 in FY 2004.

The audit points to a number of what it considers to be excessive benefits provided to top executives between October of 2000 and June of 2004. They include a combined total of up to 480 hours (12 weeks) of vacation leave and personal time off each year, with a provision allowing the individual to convert any unused time off to cash at the end of the fiscal year. Also included in what the audit considers excessive was a car or annually adjusted car allowance starting at $750 per month. This perk amounted to $146,000 in car allowances for the five employees between FY 2001 and FY 2004.

The audit finds dollars were wasted at the time MOHELA moved into its new permanent headquarters in St. Louis County. The organization moved into its new building in April of 2002, but could not get out of a lease agreement at its former location, so MOHELA paid more than $1.25-Million in lease payments over an 18-month period for a building that was no longer being used. The circumstances under which the contractor for the new building was hired come under fire as there is no documentation to support how the contractor was selected or whether there was a competitive bidding process. This lack of a competitive bidding process extends to procurement policies prior to March of 2007. The audit finds expenditures for such things as attorney services, office supplies, bulk mail services, and promotional items were made in which competitive bids or proposals were not solicited.

Various expenditures are criticized for what the audit considers to be unreasonable or imprudent use of funds. They include more than $46,000 on the annual MOHELA Board retreats. The retreats in November of 2004 and 2005 were held at a luxury resort near Branson. The November, 2006 was held in St. Louis, and came with a bar tab of $1,200.

Another area of concern is the disposition of assets – long before Governor Blunt’s Lewis and Clark proposal. Between July of 2003 and December of 2006, MOHELA disposed of more than 1,200 property items with an original cost totaling over $3.8-Million. But there are no record of the disposition of these items.

The audit concludes MOHELA has taken steps to address many of the concerns outlined. But it adds the MOHELA Board has closed its meetings on numerous occasions in recent years, and will not release the minutes of those meetings. The State Auditor’s Office says this has limited the scope of its work and has prevented the findings from being complete.

 

Download/Listen: Auditor Susan Montee News Conference (18:00 MP3)

Filed Under: Politics / Govt Tagged With: Auditor, MOHELA

MOHELA Sells Assets Even as Hearing is Pending

September 10, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

The effort to keep the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority from selling some of its assets will be the focus of a court hearing in Jefferson City tomorrow. Despite the pending hearing, the MOHELA board has voted to sell $230 milion in assets within days.

The lawsuit filed on behalf of student borrowers says the sale would violate the mission of the loan authority and would violate the board’s fiduciary responsibility to students.

Filed Under: Politics / Govt Tagged With: MOHELA

Petition Effort Launched to Overturn MOHELA Decision

May 26, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

Paperwork has been filed to launch a referendum campaign to overturn the General Assembly’s authorization of a plan to sell off $350-Million of assets of MOHELA – the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority.

Governor Matt Blunt’s Lewis & Clarke Initiative would finance construction projects on college and university campuses throughout the state and would provide money for scholarships.

The document to initiate this referendum is signed by Allen Purdy, who was one of MOHELA’s original board members and a longtime director of student aid for the University of Missouri. Purdy, who is now in his 90s, will leave the legwork to younger, more vigorous individuals. He does not plan to be active in the referendum effort.

That effort will require signatures from at least five percent of the voters in six of Missouri’s Congressional districts if the issue is to be put to a vote of the people.

Filed Under: Politics / Govt Tagged With: Matt Blunt, MOHELA

Blunt Signs MOHELA Bill; Tours State

May 24, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

Gov. Matt Blunt shakes the hand of Mo. Rep. Ester Haywood Governor Blunt is touting the benefits of the MOHELA bill as he is in the middle of a three-day tour of college campuses. Blunt is holding ceremonial bill signings of SB 389 on the campuses of colleges that will benefit from the conversion of assets from the student loan agency.

The main feature of the bill is its use of $335 million from the sale of Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority assets. The money will pay for capital improvements on nearly every college campus in the state. Noticeably absent are projects at the state’s largest university, the University of Missouri-Columbia. Senate leaders stripped money for the Columbia campus, because Columbia Senator Church Graham, a Democrat, led a filibuster against the bill. Photo: Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt shakes the hand of Mo. Rep. Ester Haywood (D-St. Louis). (UPI Photo/Bill Greenblatt)

Blunt points out the spending bill,  HB 16 , attached to the MOHELA bill contains funding for several University of Missouri projects. They just aren’t projects located in Columbia. Money has been set aside for the Delta Research Center, facilities in Atchison and Holt Counties, a biomedical swine research facility in Boone County, even a plant science research facility in Mexico, Missouri. Money also has been allocated for the three other University of Missouri campuses:  St. Louis, Rolla and Kansas City. UMKC, though, gets only a fraction of what the other campuses get, because Sen. Jolie Justus (D-Kansas City) participated in Graham’s filibuster.

Blunt has indicated he intends to restore a $31.2 million appropriation for the Ellis Fischel Center Cancer Center in Columbia. He says other projects for MU could be added later.

The MOHELA plan, officially known as the Lewis and Clark Discovery Initiative, had originally called for MOHELA to sell off $450 million in assets. It also was tailored toward life science research in an effort to help grow the emerging life science industry in Missouri. Concerns by pro-life lawmakers forced the governor to alter those plans. Missouri Right to Life and the Missouri Catholic Conference feared that money dedicated to Life Science Incubators at the University of Missouri-Columbia, Missouri State University in Springfield, Southeast Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau, and at UMKC could be used to fund embryonic stem cell research. Those projects were scrapped for less controversial ones.

Download/listen Brent Martin reports (:60 MP3)

Filed Under: Legislature, Politics / Govt Tagged With: Columbia, Department of Economic Development, Department of Higher Education, Lincoln University, Matt Blunt, MOHELA

MOHELA Bill Signed. And Signed. And Signed.

May 24, 2007 By admin Leave a Comment

Governor Blunt is touring the state, re-staging the signing of the MOHELA bill that he officially signed in his office earlier in the week.

The signing tour began within hours after Attorney General Jay Nixon urged Blunt to veto a bill that Blunt has advocated for the last two years. Nixon says the sale of the assets will cripple MOHELA’s ability to provide low-interest student loans. Nixon announced some time ago that he is campaigning against Blunt’s re-election.

A little political bombast is going along with the Governor,

Nixon’s position has fired up Senate Education Committee Chairman Gary Nodler of Joplin, who says that Nixon is committing treason in the the battle to improve higher education.

Nodler’s comments were made in St. Joseph during one of the staged bill signings. Missouri Western University in St. Joseph will get 30-million dollars for a math and science building once the MOHELA assets are sold.

 

Download Senator Nodler’s comment in St. Joseph (:17 mp3)

Filed Under: Politics / Govt Tagged With: Jay Nixon, Matt Blunt, MOHELA

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