The West County Democrats hosted Dr. Sam Page, the St. Louis County Executive today. Due to urgent commitments, his presentation was abbreviated but he did give a good update on the state of St. Louis County, and good progressive initiatives that have been implemented in the County.
The bulk of questions raised by the audience, called on his medical background and understanding of the measures taken by government to contain and otherwise protect Missouri citizens from COVID 19. Simply put, the St. Louis County department of health has the authority and the ability to monitor the disease’s progress and mandate quarantines even among commercial concerns within the county if the need arises. Testing IS available, but cannot be used on individuals not showing symptoms. Like every other governmental body, the County is dependent on cooperation and common sense from the citizen community.
While Dr. Page was presenting, trading was halted on the stock exchanges due to the dramatic drop in stock values today– reportedly associated with Coronavirus concerns and a new oil trade war between Saudi Arabia and Russia. As of today, roughly two years of stock value growth has been wiped away.
For the State of Missouri, our self-inflicted austerity has left us all very vulnerable to an economic recession, which now appears to be here. Within that framework, Glenn Koenen presented his legislative report.
Legislative Report
Federal Items:
The Coronavirus will cost America more than virtually every disaster the nation has faced – more than Hurricane Katrina and the BP Oil spill. Only the 9/11 impact has harmed the country as deeply.
Donald Trump has been quick to claim credit for the strong economy: note that he has said less about the economy over the past couple weeks and he recently blamed the government’s weak virus response on Barrack Obama.
While the House of Representatives works hard to advance necessary legislation, the Senate continues to block virtually every proposal from the House. (The $8.3 billion initial virus response package, which sailed through Congress and was signed by the President, was the extremely rare exception.)
Last month Senate leader Mitch McConnell tried to get traction for new, draconian federal restrictions on abortions. That election year ploy melted under bi-partisan pressure.
Negative interest rate government bonds have been issued by Germany and other nations: Trump has suggested that the United States could take a similar step. (Treasury bills have already fallen below the rate of inflation, meaning they already have an effective negative yield.) If the US went to negative rate bonds, well, that would devastate pension funds and others forced to invest in Treasuries.
At the same time, it would limit the cost of financing the $1.3 trillion annual deficits Trump is running-up.
Again this year, the administration is moving billions of dollars in Pentagon funding from projects specified by Congress (fighter plane refurbishment, new schools on military bases, etc.) to pay for more miles of border wall. Republicans in Congress continue to enable Donald Trump to flout the law.
Funding for most government departments have not been drastically slashed. Unfortunately, a tremendous number of critical management positions within the bureaucracy have never been filled – or have been repeatedly re-filled by new hires – by the administration. Trump also tends to make bizarre personnel choices, such as the senior advisor on filling staff positions who is still a college senior. The result, mostly hidden from public view, is a great waste of tax dollars as major operations stumble about without adequate leadership.
For example, the elimination of a few positions on critical technical teams blunted the nation’s response to the coronavirus.
Thanks to the large number of federal circuit and appeal judges appointed by Trump, as well as the two Supreme Court justices, it is now possible for a federal case to navigate the system from courtroom to courtroom never being heard by a judge not appointed by Trump until it gets to the Supreme Court!
State Items:
This session almost 2,200 bills have been filed in the Missouri legislature. Fortunately, most will die.
Still alive are some good ideas. A proposal to reduce the state sales tax (but not local taxes) on feminine hygiene products is making progress. A series of ‘technical’ bills impacting courts and young children are also making progress. And, it is possible that Missouri will update the legal framework for dealing with HIV infected persons to better reflect national norms this year.
Now for the bad news: despite extraordinary efforts by the few remaining Democratic state senators, tort reform legislation which will hurt everyday people is making progress. Punitive damages will become almost impossible to get, even when egregious conduct is proved.
A bill to prohibit surgical procedures to help transgender kids ‘adjust’ to their nature has been heard by a House committee. Despite objections from parents, doctors and others (citing a possible increase in suicides, among other issues) the bill may make it to the floor of the House. Other legislation to restrict which restrooms transgendered can use and how they compete in sports is also under consideration.
St. Louis city and every other municipal government will probably lose the ability to require that their employees reside within the municipality.
Despite horrific shortfalls in education funding, efforts to allow charter schools in most of Missouri seem on-track to succeed. (In many less populated the ‘charter schools’ are likely to be re-badged ‘Christian Academies.’) It is also possible that charters will gain 100% of the funding given public schools per student.
A total open enrollment plan – allowing any student to attend any public school their parents will take them to – is also under consideration.
Remember, super donors to state Republicans want a system where education money follows the child. Their eventual goal is for public schools to compete for kids with private and charter schools, home schooling and other options.
This being an election year, many legislators are pushing vanity projects designed to look good on their campaign literature. For example, the House has passed a new voter photo I.D. bill despite losing big time in the courts with their first efforts. The new measure would require a voter forced to vote a provisional ballot to return to the same polling place before closing time with photo I.D. proof that they are allowed to vote if they want their ballot tallied.
While only six anti-abortion bills have been filed, I expect that some sort of anti-choice measure will advance.
Again this year, the state budget is a train wreck. It seems likely that the current, reduced foundation formula for school funding will be met. Transportation money and other funds for schools will be very, very lean.
Despite a desire by the GOP to support a series of modest raises for state employees, the money isn’t there for real progress.
I suspect that a major reason for the state’s problem with keeping kids and parents on Medicaid is a cold blooded desire to lower the state’s cost for that program.
Note that despite the negative publicity associated with the 100,000+ kids kicked-off Medicaid, in multiple hearings in the Capitol Republican members have accepted and parroted the accidental governor’s claim that the problem lies with parents not being responsible and state workers not doing what they were paid to do. It is better to claim incompetence than to admit bad intent.
Glenn Koenen