Seldom have so many worked so hard to accomplish so little. That’s the good news.
The bad news? The Missouri legislature passed several bills designed to make life tougher and money more scarce for working families. And, opportunities to improve life, a bit, for the working poor never received a fair hearing.
To start, follow the money…
A day before the deadline, the House of Representatives and the Senate passed a budget for Fiscal Year 2018 (which begins this July 1st).
The legislature must authorize every penny Missouri spends, even the majority of the state budget, the targeted federal funds (for highways, MO HealthNet/Medicaid, mental health and such). While the governor has responsibility for not spending more money than the state has, they cannot increase spending. The governor can refuse to spend what the legislature authorized if they feel the state can’t afford the expense, or, if the day has a “y” in it.
So, the legislature claims that their FY18 budget…
❶ Fully funds the K – 12 School Foundation Formula;
❷ Avoids cuts championed by the governor to health care for seniors;
❸ Fairly distributes cuts among higher education institutions;
❹ Provides sufficient money for new activities (such as free I.D. for voters); and,
❺ Does not raise taxes.
Remember, before the session began Missouri faced a half billion dollar shortfall, compared to this year’s spending, due to implementation of tax cuts and other unstoppable forces.
① They funded the new, lower formula based on changes passed last year:
to fully fund the former formula would have cost $500 million or
more, not the $45 million in extra money allocated for FY18.
② Governor Greitens (aka Gov. SEAL) sent the legislature a budget calling
for thousands of seniors to lose payments for home health care
and nursing homes. The ‘counter offer’ from the House was to
fund health care by eliminating the “Circuit Breaker” credits for
lower-income seniors who rent their homes. The Senate
approach (based on a strong suggestion from Rep. Deb
Lavender, D – Kirkwood) , which prevailed, raided the piggy
banks of scores of agencies and groups to ‘sweep’ into
General Revenue the money needed for most all of the
health care and the Circuit Breaker.
③ The governor took a lot more money from Mizzou than from
many other institutions. The legislature softened that blow.
④ New required spending, such as free state I.D. for voters who
don’t have Driver Licenses, was increased from the
governor’s low-balls but probably won’t meet the entire need.
⑤ Read my lips, No New Taxes.
According to auditor Nicole Galloway, Missouri could have collected an additional$3.7 billion in revenue without trigger Hancock Amendment (Title X in the constitution) payments to some taxpayers. That would be an additional $3.7 billion against $9 billion in General Revenue. That level of funding would have fully funded all education programs, allowed raises for state workers, make roads smoother, and, snake-proof the Capitol.
Again in FY18, Missouri for political reasons will not collect all it could from the federal government. Millions will be left on the table to prevent Planned Parenthood from doing PAP smears, to save the 10¢ to 20¢ on the dollar state match for mental health programs, and – the biggie – billions won’t be used to expand Medicaid in Missouri.
Sad to say, as lean as it is, the passed budget probably is too generous.
For several years the old “consensus revenue estimate” guided state bureaucrats, the governor’s staff and the legislature in crafting a budget. In recent years the estimate used by the legislature seemed to be sprinkled with fairy dust. For FY17, for example, the legislature predicted 5% in tax revenue growth. They scaled that back to 3% when they got back to Jeff City this January, but, well, both governors Nixon and Greitens had to trim FY17 spending. (Based on revenue numbers from this March and April, a smart governor might want to snip another $25 to $35 million before the budget year ends on June 30th.)
The governor and legislature didn’t jump revenue so high for FY18 but it is very possible that the trend of over-estimating revenue will cause Governor SEAL to withhold tens of millions of dollars – perhaps even $100 million – in spending authority when the new year begins on July 1st.
Oh yes, again this year, Missouri state employees (already lowest paid in the nation) will not get a pay raise.
Moving on to non-budget bills, the House and Senate “Truly Agreed and Finally Passed” less than sixty bills and binding resolutions.
Yesterday I had the good fortune to tell my mother-in-law that Jim is now the official State Wonderdog! (Senate Bill 376) She’s long been a big Jim the Wonderdog supporter.
A lot of minor bills – moving a state courtroom from Kansas City to Independence (SB 128 and House Bill 50) and authorizing the state 911 committee to name a state 911 coordinator (SB 503), for example – got passed.
So did…
► Right To Work (SB 19), prohibiting most Project Labor Agreements [calling for use of union labor] (SB 182), and, slashing Workers’ Compensation (SB 66).
► Tort Reform, in a variety of bills limiting allowed evidence (SB 31), expert witnesses 9HB 153), settlement agreements (HB 339), and, medical malpractice liability (HB 452).
► Legalizing on the job discrimination and lessen protection for government whistleblowers (SB 43).
► Authorizing optional REAL I.D. compliant driver licenses and state I.D. cards.
► Allowing Uber and other ride-sharing companies to operate anywhere in Missouri.
► Prohibiting municipalities – such as St. Louis and Kansas City – from having local minimum wages above the state’s $7.70 an hour.
The glass half-full folks like to point out that Prevailing Wage and several other anti-worker ideas didn’t pass. Neither did a few components of Tort Reform championed by the American legislative Exchange Council and the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The first state vouchers for education – this year proposed just for students with special requirements – didn’t make it to the finish line either.
Wait till next session.
Some good ideas didn’t make it after promising starts. A Missouri version of the federal Earned Income Credit, pegged at 20% of the federal EIC, would have helped working poor families with a couple of hundred extra dollars in their pocket. Even with a Republican sponsor, it didn’t advance.
Neither did Sen. Maria Chappelle-Nadal’s (D – St. Louis Co.) effort to get a buy-out for families living too close to the radioactive landfill. The last couple of days she’s been the target of grief due to her unhappy tweet. Ironically, she used some of the same words repeatedly thrown at Democrats by some in the majority party. The conclusion must be that what’s acceptable for Republicans isn’t okay for Democrats.
Going back to what did pass, Right To Work is being challenged by labor and others promoting a citizen’s referendum: if sufficient signatures are collected (a very real possibility), all Missouri voters would get to throw-out or affirm RTW on Election Day in November 2018.
It is unlikely that the other anti-union and generally anti-worker bills will be stopped from becoming law.
Tort Reform sounds complicated, and it is. The bottom line is that an individual with a legitimate injury or cause of action will have to work harder and then get less in a settlement. The scales of justice in Missouri will now really lean to help big corporations.
When it comes to bad employers, Missouri has embraced “don’t ask, don’t tell.”
Basically, if a manager or a co-worker treats you like crap or demands sexual favors, well, after August 28th that won’t be a big problem for your employer. In a bit of irony, Senator Gary Romine (R – Farmington) who pushed to protect employers just happens to have a major discrimination suit against his business. His bill also dramatically weakens protection for government employees who point-out malfeasance by their bosses.
Move on to “optional” Real I D compliant licenses: does Missouri really believe that a TSA worker in Phoenix or a PFC at the gate of an army base in Georgia is going to know which Missouri I.D.s are acceptable and which are not? “All or nothing” seems much more practical and could be what the federal government requires. Plus, the bill passed requires the Department of Revenue to issue complaint licenses without charging drivers a fee. What will that do to their budget?
I have friends who use Uber and my daughter has the app on her phone. My personal feeling is that they call it “Uber” because “slavery” gets a bad rap. The company decides how much a driver gets to keep, and, note that they’ve lessened the driver’s share twice recently. Plus, the common sense requirement of criminal background checks with fingerprinting of for-hire drivers got tossed. Do you really know who your driver is? If this is progress I’ll pass.
While the emergency clause – which would have taken away St. Louis’ $10 an hour minimum wage right away – failed by one vote, the notion that a drywall guy from rural Missouri knows better what is good for city residents than they do is once again chiseled into law. Remember how long it took to give the city control of its own cops? That grudge went back to the Civil War and lasted 150 years. It is obvious that the majority in the Missouri legislature is for local control unless it is something their real employers (the big contributors) don’t want. Every city and county in the state must be prepared to fight (though they’ll probably lose) for every reasonable idea they have to move themselves forward. We know how Jeff City feels about minimum wage and plastic grocery bags. What will they question next session?
Not apparent from summary of passed bills is the tone in the Capitol this session. Watching in person a couple of times and listening in via the Internet very frequently, well, many of the Republicans don’t like each other. Intemperate words, rudeness, violation of the rules of the chamber (especially noticeable in the normally staid Senate) and rulings from the chair not based on rules or reality predominated this session. And, give me a Bible, I swear the acting Speaker late on the last Wednesday of session declared passed by voice vote a measure which I heard no one ‘say aye’ to but to which a helluva of a lot shouted ‘no.’
Alas, better than 99% of Missourians will never visit the legislature while it is in session nor listen in to debate. All they’ll know of the 2017 session will come from newsletters mailed by the perpetrators or brief media accounts.
Soon, unfortunately, they will feel the impact of what happened along the banks of the Missouri in the first four and a half months of the year.
Oh yes, snakes in the Capitol? They had a brief power failure on the last day of session. Per a member of the legislature, a snake crawled into a major electrical service box. It was his last crawl.
Kind of fitting, actually.
Submitted by Glenn Koenen, WCD Member