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Treasurer candidate Sen. Schmitt welcomes debate about tax cut proposals (AUDIO)

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Republican state Senator Eric Schmitt (R-Glendale) ended months of speculation about his political future Wednesday by declaring his candidacy for the State Treasurer’s office in the 2016 campaign cycle.

Senator Eric Schmitt

Senator Eric Schmitt

Schmitt has helped author the major tax cut proposals of the last two legislative sessions, both of which were vetoed by Governor Jay Nixon (D), with the latter of the two vetoes having been overturned. He knows if he becomes the Republican nominee for Treasurer in 2016, those tax cut bills are likely to be focused on by any Democratic opponent. He says he welcomes that debate.

“I hope that this campaign is about issues like reforming our tax code, and again I’m proud of the leadership role that I’ve been able to have in that debate,” says Schmitt. “I think any time we can allow people to keep more of what they earn, people to have more take home pay, that means a lot for families all across this state.”

Schmitt as Treasurer he can draw on his time as the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Jobs, Economic Development and Local Government.

“In that office I think you are uniquely positioned to make sure that people are aware of what that growth strategy is, what it should be for our state, and I’m looking forward to that,” says Schmitt.

Schmitt, a lawyer, cannot seek another term in the Senate. He had been considered a likely candidate for attorney general.

Senator Kurt Schaefer (R-Columbia) has already declared his candidacy for Attorney General and House Speaker Tim Jones (R-Eureka) has also been considering running for that office. Schmitt says they didn’t factor in his decision not to join that race.

“The treasurer’s office is a natural … there’s alignment there with some of the things I’ve spent a lot of time on and policies I’ve advocated for, so for me that was the office that made sense,” says Schmitt.

One of his priorities during his time in the legislature has been finding ways to help patients and families deal with autism. Schmitt has an autistic son, and says that will remain a priority to him if he is elected Treasurer.

“I empathise and I want to do everything I can in that office to make programs available for folks,” says Schmitt. “One of the things I think I can also bring to that job is I have a good working relationship with both Republicans and Democrats in both the House and the Senate, and so to the extent there are priorities that we need to get passed I feel confident working with the legislature to try to move those priorities through.”

At the end of April, Schmitt had more than $866,000 in his campaign account.

AUDIO:  Mike Lear interviews Senator Eric Schmitt, 10:22

MO House Speaker says VA problems support argument against Medicaid expansion (AUDIO)

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The Republican Speaker of the Missouri House says recent problems with the Veterans Health Administration support the stance his caucus has taken against Medicaid expansion. Tim Jones (R-Eureka) has been opposed to using federal dollars to expand eligibility for that program in Missouri since Governor Jay Nixon (D) raised the issue in late 2012.

House Speaker Tim Jones (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

House Speaker Tim Jones (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

He says issues that have come to light  – veterans needing care being on secret waiting lists, some veterans dying while waiting for care, and records being falsified to reflect shorter wait times than actually experienced – illustrate the problems of having government-run a healthcare system.

“We actually look extremely smart and wise in not expanding Medicaid up to this point,” says Jones.

“The VA healthcare system, the federal Obamacare law and state Medicaid systems – the commonality is they’re all run by a form of the government,” says Jones. “The Medicaid system has now got the heavy hand of the federal government trying to use the carrot-and-stick approach of using the federal bill to expand the state systems.”

“We cannot put our heads in the sand and ignore potential similarities and analogies that can be drawn between the federal government running one massive national healthcare system on one hand versus another,” he adds.

Jones says Medicaid must be reformed rather than just have millions more in tax dollars be applied to the current system.

Medicaid expansion is an issue many Democrats running this year for state legislative seats will focus on.

AUDIO:  Jones says running on Medicaid expansion in this year’s campaigns would be a mistake

House Republican leaders: Nixon using fear tactics to back vetoes, overturn attempts uncertain this soon

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House Republican leaders accuse Governor Jay Nixon (D) of using fear tactics and overblown numbers in his assessment of the ten tax break bills he vetoed last week, but they don’t yet know if their party will seek to overturn his vetoes.

Nixon says those ten bills would cost state, county and city budgets $776-million dollars in revenue he says would be lost to “sweetheart deals” for special interests. He has been traveling the state to promote his arguments in defense of the vetoes, and telling local governments to leave room in their budgets to absorb the losses he says would be incurred if the legislature overturns those vetoes.

House Speaker Tim Jones (R-Eureka) tells local governments to use their own analysis.

“Because my impression of what these bills tried to do, what their intent was, was to reign in Governor Nixon’s out of control Department of Revenue, which has been out of control in many ways,” says Jones.

Majority Floor Leader John Diehl (R-Town and Country) says the local government leaders he’s talked to aren’t taking the Governor’s message about those ten bills seriously.

“His playbook of scare tactics is wearing pretty thin with people,” says Diehl of the governor. “He’s cried wolf on numerous different occasions over the past couple of years, none of which have proven to be true.”

Legislative analyst estimates on what the fiscal impact of most of those bills could be are still being updated, but Jones says he’s hearing that Nixon’s estimates are off.

“The consensus is that the governor’s numbers are completely inflated and generally seem to be pulled out of thin air without a lot of backup data,” says Jones. “I know that’s why the proponents of the bills and the sponsors are doing their best to make sure that their analysis is fully supported by the facts. They were comfortable about that the first time around, so we’re just going back and double checking.”

Several House Republicans have alluded to possible attempts to override Nixon’s vetoes of at least one of those bills when lawmakers return for the annual veto session in September, but Diehl says it is premature to predict whether such attempts will be made.

“We will take a look at the governor’s veto message to see if any valid points are raised in the veto message. Here, I don’t think there are any,” says Diehl. “We then take that veto message and the bill and we’ll discuss it as a caucus in August when we all meet again.”

Diehl says House and Senate Republican leaders must also meet before any decisions will be made about addressing the governor’s vetoes.

“I think it’s premature,” says Diehl of announcing overturn attempt now, “but I think there’s a strong possibility that we’ll make efforts to do that.”

See an earlier story on the ten bills vetoed by Governor Nixon

Weighing in on whether to veto the transfer bill and call a special session

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Critics of the bill that proposes change to Missouri’s student transfer law say it doesn’t fix anything, and want Governor Jay Nixon (D) to tell lawmakers to try again.

The bill lawmakers sent to Governor Nixon includes a provision that after three years of a district in St. Louis City or County and Jackson County being unaccredited, would allow its local tax dollars to go to a nearby private school if its students transfer there.

Opponents like Representative Genise Montecillo (D-St. Louis) say that’s all the bill was about, and they want Nixon to veto it.

“I’ve heard from all of my superintendents, I’ve heard from my constituents. I don’t think there’s a superintendent in this state that supports this plan,” says Montecillo. “Those people that understand education and what it takes to improve education outcomes opposed this plan, and yet they continued to refuse to take vouchers off the table. If that’s not about agenda, then explain to me what it is about.”

Nixon has said he opposes any legislation that would let tax dollars go to private schools, but hasn’t said what he will do with this bill.

Some lawmakers say Nixon has indicated to them a veto and special session are coming

He tells reporters he knows he must act soon, with one school district bankrupt and another close to it because of the cost of student transfers.

“We’re going to expedite a review of this bill,” says Nixon. “Obviously I’ll have to make a decision on it relatively quickly because of the fiscal timeframes involved.”

Opponents of the bill want Nixon to call a special session so that a new bill can be created. He has not said whether he will.

House Speaker Tim Jones (R-Eureka) says if that happens, he wants to see more involvement from the Governor in a solution.

“If the governor vetoes this issue, then he owns it and he has to come up with a solution,” says Jones. “I will challenge him to propose and work with us, like he did in the Boeing special session. You saw that when this governor wants to, he can actually engage with the legislature, be a leader and get things done in a short period of time.”

Montecillo says it’s not up to the Governor to propose a plan.

“We have a plan,” says Montecillo. “The problem that [Republicans] have and what they dislike about that, it is a clean transfer fix. It addresses a single problem facing the state. It is void of the agenda that they want to push and promote.”
Opponents of the bill say the Governor has some leverage over what lawmakers might or might not attempt to put into a bill in a special session through the call he would issue for that session.

House Republicans and Democrats recap 2014 legislative session (VIDEOS)

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Both parties in the state House assessed the regular session of the General Assembly after it wrapped up on Friday in back-to-back media conefrences.  Here is the video of those conferences (courtesy Jonathan Lorenz, Missouri House Communications).

Republicans:

Democrats:

Budget director: will work with lawmakers on how association dues are paid

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The state’s budget director tells House Republicans the Nixon Administration’s budget office is willing to work with legislative budget makers to change how the state pays dues to organizations its agencies and elected officials belong to.

Republicans called attention this week to the paying of dues to the National Governors Association out of the budget for the Department of Social Services’ administration. For three years that added up to more than $390,000 dollars.

See earlier story

Budget committee members including Representative Caleb Rowden (R-Columbia) feel they appropriated money to be used by that agency, not to pay organization dues.

“We feel like we’ve been duped, I think it what it really boils down to, intentional or not,” Rowden told State Budget Director Linda Luebbering. “It’s absolutely and unequivocally wrong, and there’s no other way to put it.”

Luebbering told the committee she doesn’t have the authority to commit to changing how dues are paid, but said she would talk with others in the Nixon Administration and future legislative budget makers about the issue.

“I have committed that we are willing to work with the House and Senate to see if we can’t come to agreement on how to do this differently in the future.”

Republicans say the appearance is that the paying of the Governors Association dues was being hidden, but Luebbering says that was not the intention.

“There are dues paid in a lot of different places in appropriations. They don’t have specific line items. This is not any different from the other ones,” Luebbering told lawmakers. “Clearly we felt it was appropriate, clearly previous administrations have paid it from various places as well.”

Luebbering notes other expenses such as food are also covered out of administrative appropriations that don’t have specific line items.  She says the expenditures can be found on the Missouri Accountability Portal.

“We think it is just as transparent as any other dues that are paid in state government,” says Luebbering.

Representative Chris Kelly (D-Columbia) disagrees, and calls the expenditures, “clearly not transparent, extremely opaque.”

Representative Robert Ross (R-Yukon) says “incredible” is that the Governors Association dues were paid out of the Social Services budget in September of 2013, three months into the fiscal year’s budget.

“If that’s the case, clearly we have been over appropriating to Children’s Division, Social Services, the whole gamut, if they already know at that point that they have extra money and can say, ‘Hey, let’s pay the Governors Dues on this.'”

Kelly says the only way such expenditures will stop is if future budget committees do a more extensive job of going over the state budget.

“I think we are not doing as good a job managing the budget as Jeremiah Nixon is at spending the money,” says Kelly. “We’ve seen example after example of example of that brilliance, about how he finds ways to spend the money in ways that we don’t authorize.”

Kelly suggested twice the amount spent on dues be removed from the governor’s budget for Fiscal Year 2016.

House Speaker Tim Jones (R-Eureka) in his comments Friday on the end of the regular session of the General Assembly hinted that work to review such expenditures will continue during the legislative interim.

House Republicans, Gov. Nixon clash on use of Social Services money for National Governors Association dues (VIDEO)

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State House Republicans  are criticizing Governor Jay Nixon (D) for the use of more than $390,000 in the past three fiscal years’ budgets for the Department of Social Services to pay dues to the National Governors Association. More than $206,000 of that has come from the Children’s Division within the Department of Social Services to pay dues to the National Governors Association.

The office of Representative Sue Allen (R-Town and Country) has offered documents it says show how that membership was paid for. They show money was taken from the appropriations to several agencies, but in fiscal years 2012, 2013 and in the current budget, the greatest amount came from the Children’s Division. About $69,000 was taken from the Division’s budget in each of those years. $32,000 was taken from Missouri Healthnet administration in fiscal years 2012 and 2014 and about $29,000 was taken from Missouri Healthnet administration in fiscal year 2013 and $28,000 from Family Support administration.

The National Governors Association is a bipartisan organization of the nation’s state governors. Through it those governors discuss policy and priorities and share best practices, and the association advocates on federal issues impacting states.

Allen, House Speaker Tim Jones (R-Eureka) and House Budget Committee Chairman Rick Stream (R-Kirkwood) say Nixon’s actions violate the title clause of that budget bill, that says, “no funds from these sections shall be expended for the purpose of costs associated with the offices of the Governor,” or the other elected officials of the state.

“The Governor and his staff know that we appropriated the money for a specific purpose; for children, for Children’s Services,” says Stream, “and they deliberately spent it somewhere else. To me that’s just deceptive.”

Stream adds, “[Nixon] basically misspent the money, and we’re hoping that he will not continue to do it.”

Jones says it’s an issue of transparency.

“There’s nothing wrong with the National Governor’s Association,” says Jones, “but if [Nixon] wants to spend money on that it should come from a delineated line item in his budget.”

Representative Sue Allen (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Representative Sue Allen (photo courtesy; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Allen took the issue up Wednesday at a hearing by the Appropriations Committee on Health, Mental Health, and Social Services, which she chairs. Department of Social Services Director Brian Kinkade told the committee the National Governors Association deals with federal issues, including those related to his department’s functions.

“One that has been worked on recently is the Prison Rape Elimination Act,” says Kinkade. “NGA’s been involved in advocacy with the states on that issue.” Kinkade says that act is related to the work of the Division of Youth Services.

Kinkade says the proposal to take the Governors Association dues came from the Office of Administration’s Division of Budget & Planning.

Troubles for Children’s Division answered with money this year

Nixon proposed and legislature appropriated an additional $5.1 million Children’s Division to create two new positions on its career ladder for child abuse investigators and other changes, meant to improve the Division’s response to child abuse investigations. That proposal is part of the Fiscal Year 2015 budget proposal that is awaiting action by Nixon.

Deparrtment of Social Services Director Brian Kinkade (right) and Department of Mental Health Director Keith Schafer

Department of Social Services Director Brian Kinkade (right) and Department of Mental Health Director Keith Schafer testify to the House Appropriations Committee on Health, Mental Health and Social Services.

Republicans have pointed to that appropriation and asked whether there would then have been a better agency to have taken money from to page the Governors Association dues.

“Federal funds are as important for the Children’s Division as any in our Department, so in looking at how to allocate that across our Department that’s not an unfair allocation,” says Kinkade.

Kinkade adds, “I need to be very clear though: this in no way jeopardized direct services or field service for our child welfare program.”

Allen says that still is not the appropriate place to draw those funds from.

“They still used funds from a very, very, I’ll say ‘weak’ program; Children’s Division, because over the past few years we’ve had children die,” says Allen.

Kinkade says the money came from the Department’s central administration and would have gone unused if not used to pay for the Governors Association membership.

Allen isn’t satisfied with that answer.

“If these people were incapable of recognizing ways to go beyond and further support these children,” with that money, Allen says, “that’s a problem.”

House Republicans say they also want to know if other money being appropriated in the budget is being used for purposes they aren’t aware of or don’t intend.

“We’ll certainly take a look. A much closer look,” says Stream.

In a statement, Nixon says the same funding source has been used in past years and calls the issues the House Republicans raise a “diversionary stunt,” that will “fall flat with Missourians wondering why their elected representatives refuse to reform our ethics laws, rein in wasteful tax credit expenditures or provide health coverage to 300,000 working Missourians through Medicaid expansion.”

The documents provided by Allen’s office and communication with a then-staffer for former Governor Matt Blunt (R) suggest that the dues for the Governors Association were not taken from the Social Services budget by administrations prior to Nixon’s.

Nixon adds, “I urge these legislators to set aside these desperate distractions and use the time they have left in the session to work on making a real difference for the Missourians we serve.”

House Democrats want Medicaid expansion vote before they’ll vote for transportation sales tax hike

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The Missouri House Democrats’ leader says they’re angry about the veto override on a tax cut bill, so much so that they won’t vote for a proposed sales tax hike to support transportation if the Republican House Majority doesn’t bring Medicaid expansion up for a vote.

The situation raises doubt about the fate of the three-quarters-of-a-cent transportation tax that had seemed likely to pass.

The House on Tuesday completed a legislative override of Governor Jay Nixon’s (D) veto of the tax cut legislation, SB 509, that he and House Democrats said was unnecessary and “dangerous,” and puts funding for state programs and services like education in jeopardy. All 108 Republicans in the House voted for the override along with one Democrat, Keith English (Florissant).

“I think right now the caucus feels that it’s awfully hypocritical to be asking for a tax increase when we’ve just cut taxes,” says Minority Floor Leader Jake Hummel (D-St. Louis).

34 House Democrats voted for the transportation tax, HJR 68, when it cleared the House, while 38 Republicans voted against it.

“They have to have our votes to pass it,” says Hummel. “If they’d like to give us a vote on Medicaid maybe we can talk about that.”

Hummel says it is time for Medicaid expansion to be brought to a vote on the House Floor. Last year a bill was debated in the House but withdrawn without a vote.

“If the majority [Republicans want] to vote it down that’s fine, but give us the opportunity,” says Hummel. “This is such a huge coalition across the state. Just give us … give everybody … a chance. Give them a vote. What are [Republicans] worried about? That they don’t have enough people to vote it down?”

House Speaker Tim Jones (R-Eureka) says he had not heard of the Democrats drawing the connection between the transportation sales tax and Medicaid prior to speaking to Missourinet.

“I don’t really see the connectivity between the two,” says Jones, “My gut reaction would be the caucus would not be much interested in a deal of that sort.”

If Republican leadership decides to put Medicaid expansion to a vote, there are some bills that could be potential vehicles for it. Two Senate bills, SB 504 and SB 754, are on the list of Senate Bills ready to be passed out of the House that relate to health care or insurance coverage. Those could potentially have Medicaid language amended to them before a vote.

Another bill, SB 524, was amended in a House Committee to include Medicaid expansion language in an effort led by Representative Chris Molendorp (R-Belton), who has been supportive of expansion. His position has put him at odds with most of his fellow Republicans. Molendorp called the vote, “symbolic,” but the bill could be brought to the floor in the final week.

“It’s that time of year when there are a lot of issues that aren’t related at all that kind of get thrown into the same pot for people to start picking and choosing … they’ll support this if you’ll support that,” says Senator Mike Kehoe (R-Jefferson City), the sponsor of the transportation sales tax bill in the Senate. “It doesn’t surprise me that there are people trying to tie one thing to another.”

Kehoe says he will spend time this weekend talking to legislators about moving the transportation tax forward.  It also has labor support, including from the Laborers Union of Missouri and the United Transportation Union, who testified for it during a House hearing in February.

Hummel says he knows there is union support for the tax, and a need for funding for infrastructure improvements.

“I don’t think a lot of us are happy at what the funding mechanism is for this,” says Hummel. “I’d love to get some kind of compromise between the tax and Medicaid, but just have to see how it goes.”

The proposal was to raise the sales tax one percent for transportation when it left the House but the Senate changed it to the three-quarters-of-a-cent plan.  If it is passed by the legislature it would go to voters in November or at a special election to be called by the governor.

‘Flimsy’ Republicans join caucus leadership ahead of debate of income tax cut (VIDEO)

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11 of the so-called “flimsy 15” stood with House Republican Leaders in an apparent show of caucus solidarity ahead of debate, and likely a vote on, Senate tax cut legislation this afternoon. 

The House has taken up Senator Will Kraus’ (R-Lee’s Summit) legislation, SB 509, for possible passage to Governor Jay Nixon (D).  It would cut income taxes by one-half percent over several years beginning in 2017. The “flimsy 15” was what a pro-business lobbying group called 15 Republicans who voted with Democrats last year to veto a proposed income tax cut.

 

One of the most vocal opponents of last year’s bill was Representative Nate Walker (R-Kirksville), who called that legislation “flawed” and said he had to do what was right for his constituents. Walker says he was not coerced to stand with his caucus’ leadership today.

“It was my choice to be there and I support [Kraus’] bill,” Walker tells Missourinet.

He says the lawmakers among that 15, 14 of which are still in the House, met after the veto session and talked to House Republican leadership about their concerns.

“I think this is a good step and I think we need to try this,” Walker says, “and I think the economy will benefit from it.”

“I know why they called us,” says Representative Mike Thomson (R-Maryville), another of the 15. “But we’re a part of the caucus. We always vote our district and our feelings.”

Thomson asks why similar attention hasn’t been paid to Republicans who voted against Right to Work last week in the House. “I don’t know why we were singled out on this to be quite honest.”