Fiscal Year 2019 budget – Missouri House of Representatives Newsroom

House votes to override governor on four budget items; Senate takes no action

The Missouri House voted to override the governor’s vetoes of four items in the state operating budget that became law in July. The Senate has opted not to take up those items for consideration, so the governor’s vetoes will stand.

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick proposed the overrides of five vetoes the governor made in the state’s budget. The House voted for four of those overrides. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

The House voted to override Governor Mike Parson’s (R) vetoes on line-items that support juvenile advocacy units in the Kansas City and St. Louis offices of the state public defender; time-critical centers for heart attack and stroke patients in Missouri hospitals; independent reviews by the Office of Child Advocate of local offices that serve troubled youths; and the oversight of grants to organizations that serve the deaf and blind. The four items totaled more than $785,000.

House budget leaders said those items will be brought up for consideration when the legislature meets again in January, for the start of its regular session.

The House voted only on five budget items during its annual veto session, which began and ended Wednesday. On the fifth budget item, $50,000 for grants to law enforcement agencies for the purchase of tourniquets for officers, the House fell short of the constitutional majority needed for an override.

Money for inspections of state-certified heart attack and stroke trauma centers

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob) said after the governor vetoed money to fund inspections and certification of time-critical trauma centers for heart attack and stroke patients, his administration then said those inspections would be conducted anyway. Fitzpatrick said he wants to see the inspections continue, but for them to be funded by pulling money from parts of the budget not intended for them violates the role of the legislature in the budget process.

“The governor vetoed all the people and all the money for that particular program and my opinion is once you do that, you can’t fund that program,” said Fitzpatrick. “That is going to come to a head in January. It is going to be an issue and it will get dealt with in a different way.”

The top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, Kip Kendrick (Columbia), agreed.

“I don’t know exactly how that program moves forward if the line’s been vetoed and the two [full-time employees] in the program have been vetoed. We want to see the program move forward, but also how does the program exist if it doesn’t have a line and a place in the budget … I don’t want to see any of the services disrupted or interrupted, but that being said we need to make sure that we’re handling things appropriately.” said Kendrick.

Money for Office of Child Advocate review of local abuse investigations

$100,000 for the Office of Child Advocate would pay for two people that St. Charles Republican Kurt Bahr said would conduct a thorough review of how child abuses cases are processed. He said the office needs those two additional staff members to keep up with that extra work.

“We are making sure that we’re taking care of kids in the foster care system, we’re making sure that any charge of child abuse is being looked at and is being processed correctly so that the system works for the most vulnerable in our society,” said Bahr.

Money for oversight of grants to organizations serving Missouri’s deaf and blind

The $45,000 for the Missouri Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing would pay for a person to oversee grants to organizations serving the deaf and blind. That position was created as part of House Bill 1696 passed in 2016, which was sponsored by Representative Lyle Rowland (R-Cedarcreek). He said those grants have been fully funded for the past two years.

“In our world today we want all moneys from government to have accountability, and we need to have a person in place in that commission that oversee this money, can answer questions, can develop the [requests for proposal], to allow this to take place to help the deaf, blind community,” said Rowland.

Shrewsbury Democrat Sarah Unsicker said the person currently overseeing these grants has a number of other jobs and is overwhelmed.

Representative Kip Kendrick (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

“People who are deaf/blind need additional services including language acquisition, communication assistance, and help with activities of daily living. The Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing is not equipped to deal with these specialized needs of this population by themselves and needs this staff person to assist with these needs,” said Unsicker.

Money for public defenders for juveniles in Kansas City and St. Louis

Fitzpatrick said the $487,000 for juvenile advocacy units in the St. Louis and Kansas City offices of the public defender system would ensure that the constitutional right to counsel for juveniles in those regions would be met.

Bahr said those juveniles need proper defense attorneys to keep them from entering a “prison pipeline where they end up becoming a far larger cost onto our society as perpetual inmates.”

Representative Ingrid Burnett (D-Kansas City) said as a teacher she worked with elementary school children both before and after these public defender units for juveniles existed.

“The difference between the outcome for these children is staggering,” said Burnett.

Kansas City Democrat Barbara Washington said she has personal experience as a juvenile offender, and said the importance of juveniles having representation cannot be overstated.

“I sit here today because I had an attorney. I sit here today because my parents could afford an attorney and I can state today that no one else who was incarcerated with me at that time was even able to graduate from high school, and that was because at that time there was not a public defender system totally dedicated to juvenile offender,” said Washington.

No hard feelings from the House toward the governor over budget vetoes

Both Fitzpatrick and Kendrick said the attempts to override Parson’s vetoes did not signal a battle between the House and the governor’s office.

“The governor came into office in June and basically had one month to review the budget at the same time he was trying to assemble his team. I think that unfortunately there were some things they didn’t get the full picture on and had to make some decisions before they had all the information,” said Fitzpatrick. “We’ll continue to work with the governor. This is not intended to be an issue that is supposed to disrupt the relationship. It’s just a part of the process.”

Kendrick was not critical of the governor, even regarding the veto of funding for time-critical trauma center inspections and the procedural issues surrounding its continued funding.

“Everybody makes mistakes, right? We all make mistakes. Sometimes you’ve just got to own up to the mistake that you make … I don’t think Governor Parson wanted to see this program disappear. Soon after I think he realized that it’s an important program obviously not just to us here in the building but to everyone around the State of Missouri,” said Kendrick.

Legislature includes money for K-3rd grade dyslexia screenings in FY ’19 budget

The budget approved last week by the Missouri legislature includes some money for screening children for dyslexia while they are in kindergarten through the third grade. Those screenings are required under a bill the legislature approved two years ago.

Representative Kathy Swan (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

That bill, House Bill 2379, was sponsored by Cape Girardeau Republican Kathryn Swan. It required those screenings to begin in the coming school year and created a task force to develop recommendations for how they should be conducted.

The budget includes $250,000 that would help some schools pay for those screenings.

Students who have dyslexia often struggle in every subject in school, can fall behind their peers, and even be victims of ridicule because of their struggling. Swan said beginning to screen all students for dyslexia will reveal earlier which students have it and need to be educated differently so that they don’t have those struggles.

“When we’re talking one out of five people being dyslexic, it’s not something that’s outgrown; it’s a neurological disorder that tends to run in families that people accommodate for sometimes themselves, but obviously it can impact reading and you have to be able to read in order to learn,” said Swan.

Swan said identifying earlier in life those who have dyslexia and then helping them deal with it could also save the state money in the long run in a number of ways, not the least of which being to keep some of those students off a path that often leads to prison.

“Not only does it make sense from helping students graduate from school on time and prepared, whether they want to go into the workforce or whether they want to go on for some kind of additional training or go to college, but it can also help prevent some substance abuse, incarcerations in prison – most incarcerations in prison are related to a substance abuse of some sort – so long-term this is a small investment to make with a big return on family lives and on success in one’s career and life,” said Swan.

Swan said she would like to have seen more than $250,000 go toward dyslexia screenings, but was grateful that the state could provide any money toward that purpose. She also said the fact that there is now a line in the budget to support screenings increases the likelihood that the state will spend more toward them in future years.

Swan has spent several legislative sessions working on issues related to dyslexia. She said after realizing that one in five people must deal with that condition, she saw that those people need help.

“We had to do something not only to help the quality of life for people, we had to do something because of the impact it has on our prisons and the rest of society, because that does impact the rest of society,” said Swan. “So it just became critical and we had to do something, and I felt as the educational community we were not being responsible if we were not addressing this need because it is such a significant need.”

HB 2379 also required additional training for teachers so that they can recognize the signs of a possible dyslexia diagnosis.

“We’re going to screen grades K-3, so if there’s a student outside that – maybe there’s a student that transfers in – so we want teachers to have the knowledge in order to be able to determine, ‘You know, there might be something going on here, I think we need to screen this student,’ or, ‘Let’s try moving him or her closer to the board,’ or, ‘Let’s not make them read aloud in a round-robin,’ or, ‘Let’s give them more time for their test,’ or, ‘Let’s give them an oral test,’” said Swan. “We’ve got to help arm the teachers with information so they know some simple things they can do in the classroom to help.”

The House and Senate agreed last week on a $28.3-billion spending proposal for the fiscal year that begins July 1. That plan will next go to the governor for his consideration.

Earlier stories:

Task Force on Dyslexia issues recommendations for dyslexia screenings of Missouri students

Legislative Task Force on Dyslexia holds first hearing, Rep. Swan selected as chair

Legislature’s budget proposal would boost employee pay and benefits, study pay by job class

State employees would receive a pay raise beginning January 1 under the budget the legislature proposed last week, and their health care benefits would also be bolstered.

The ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee, Kip Kendrick (left) and House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

The legislature approved a budget that would increase by $700 the pay of employees making less than $70,000 a year. Those making more than $70,000 would receive a 1-percent increase.

It would also pump $61-million into the Missouri Consolidated Health Care Plan – the insurance program for most state workers. Budget makers say MCHCP was close to depleting its reserve funds, and they hope that the infusion of money in this budget will stave off premium increases for state employees.

“I don’t think there’s enough discussion in the state right now on the condition of Missouri Consolidated Health Care Plan,” said Columbia representative Kip Kendrick, the leading Democrat on the House Budget Committee. “Any new funding that we could do for them this year – I’m glad we could get to $61-million in new decision item funding for Missouri Consolidated – it’ll help offset that. I suspect there will be plan changes and premium increases, but it will help us at least keep those costs somewhat contained.”

The budget also includes an additional $350-per year increase in pay for prison guards. House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob) said lawmakers have heard that the Department of Corrections has had increasing difficulty in hiring and retaining guards, and that is in part due to the offered salary not being great enough.

Fitzpatrick and Kendrick agreed that while there are employees throughout the state to whom they would like to give greater pay increases, corrections officers’ pay needed immediate attention.

“The raise we agreed to specifically for corrections officers combined with the raise for all state employees amounts to over a $1000 increase, which for some of these corrections officers who are making in the high 20s, low 30s per year I think is significant,” said Fitzpatrick. “That, by itself, probably isn’t going to be a game-changer but hopefully it’ll help reduce turnover and help us with the issue we have with the vacancies in that area.”

$3.2-million would go to increase pay for public defenders. Kendrick said the average public defender starting out is making $39,000 a year.

“Typically having a new law degree and an average debt of over $100,000, $39,000 does not go nearly far enough. We needed to do what we could make sure we increased pay for public defenders to somewhat balance the justice system again,” said Kendrick. “Nothing against prosecutors – prosecutors are great. They tend to be paid much better than public defenders and when you have that it kind of tilts the balance even more so in the direction of the prosecutors.”

Kendrick said bolstering the state’s public defenders could save the state money by slowing the growth of its prison population.

The budget also includes a $6.3-million boost in pay for the state’s Highway Patrol troopers.

Fitzpatrick said perhaps more significant for state employees than the pay and benefits increases in this budget could be funding for a reward for performance study requested by the Office of Administration.

“We’re going to give them the opportunity to go out and really study all the job classes in the state – what we’re asking people to do and trying to compare and find out what the market rate is on that, so that we can get a real good sense of what job classes we really need to focus on,” said Fitzpatrick. “I think we have some job classes in the state that are probably overpaid, I think we probably have some that are severely underpaid, and some that are probably right about where they need to be.”

Fitzpatrick said with the information from that study the legislature could begin, even next year, working to get Missouri out of last place among all states in employee pay.

The legislature’s budget lays out more than $28.3-billion in proposed spending of state-controlled money. It was approved on Wednesday, two days ahead of the constitutional deadline, and will next be sent to the governor.

Legislature’s budget could help counties save money on holding state prisoners

The budget passed by the Missouri legislature this week aims to get the state caught up in payments to counties for holding state prisoners, and to give counties cheaper options for taking care of those prisoners.

Representative Kathie Conway (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

The budget includes more than $34-million to reimburse county jails that hold inmates on state charges until they are transferred into state custody. Missouri statute calls for the state to reimburse each county $22.58 per day for every state inmate that county holds in its jail. Missouri is about 6-months behind in those reimbursements according to House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob).

Out of that $34-million, counties can spend up to $5-million in state funds on alternative methods for tracking inmates – methods including ankle monitors or a smartphone app for monitoring of prisoners.

“There’s talk of, for super-low-risk offenders, potentially letting them out with an app on their phone – basically they’ll have to check in with facial recognition requirements and they have to check in however many times a day the court wants them to check in from their home,” said House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick. “It’s a riskier method but it’s also much less expensive and if we feel like somebody’s not a risk of fleeing or something like that, it’d be a low-cost option.”

“This is a chance for the state and the counties to save money up front, and hopefully start catching up with the reimbursements we owe the counties and keep costs down going forward,” said Representative Kathie Conway (R-St. Charles), the Chair of the budget subcommittee that deals with the Departments of Public Safety and Corrections.

“[The state only releases] $10-million per quarter [in county reimbursements], so if [a county gets] the money that’s fine, then you have to wait for the n ext quarter to start getting reimbursed again. There are a lot of counties out there that just can’t afford to do that,” said Conway. “This $5-million also gives other counties the opportunity to use this GPS tracker system if they wish … if they can use this electronic tracking system for the cost of what one day [of holding a state prisoner] would be, they’re actually going to catch up with their arrears a lot sooner.”

Conway has also been working for several years to develop a similar program that will be launching as a pilot in Audrain, Montgomery, and Warren Counties. It will use a bracelet similar to those people wear to track the number of steps they take each day, popularly known as a “FitBit.”

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

“It worked with [a smart phone app], and rather than the $12.50 a day that it costs for the ankle bracelet, this was around $15 to $20 a month. People could be out on probation and every three minutes this would send a ping for GPS and the probation and parole officer would always know their location, could send them notification of court dates and different payments that were due,” said Conway. “[We] set up a pilot program where it could be pre-conviction as well, and I think the significance of that is most of the cost for county jails to hold prisoners for the state came before the conviction.”

Counties could utilize that $5-million for any “alternative jail sanctions,” as these prisoner tracking options are being called, that don’t cost more than $12.50 per day. If not all of the $5-million is utilized, it will roll back into the money used to reimburse counties.

The legislature voted to approve its budget proposal on Wednesday, two days ahead of its constitutional deadline.

Budget proposal maintains House’s steep cuts to DHSS after dispute over virus data

House and Senate conferees have agreed to a budget that would make significant cuts in the Department of Health and Senior Services’ director’s office. House members say that department is needlessly withholding information about a virus outbreak that killed two people in Missouri, including one state employee.

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (in foreground, right) and Senate Budget Committee Chairman Dan Brown (foreground, left) speak to Senator Jamilah Nasheed while House Budget Committee Vice Chairman Justin Alferman (top, center) speaks to Senators Dan Hegeman (top left) and Kiki Curls during a break in the conference committee hearing Monday. Those senators had concerns about Reps. Fitzpatrick’s and Alferman’s intentions to cut money that amounts to the salaries of several people in the Department of Health and Senior Services’ Director’s office, including the director. (photo; Mike Lear, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

The conference committee agreed to cut money equal to the salaries of eight positions in the director’s office, including the director.

House Budget Committee Vice Chairman Justin Alferman (R-Hermann) is one of several lawmakers who have asked how many people in Missouri have tested positive for the antibodies to the Bourbon virus. The House has also subpoenaed the Department seeking that information, and the Department still hasn’t provided it.

The Director of the Department of Health and Senior Services, who had not appeared before the House Budget Committee for any of its public hearings, did appear before the conference committee between House and Senate members that met Monday night to agree on a budget proposal for both chambers to vote on this week. Dr. Randall Williams maintains he can’t release what Alferman and others are asking for.

“Missouri law and HIPAA are very clear that if I provide information that can identify you in a small sample size, [that’s a violation],” said Williams.

The Department’s General Counsel, Nikki Loethen, told the committee, “The issue here is that there is already significant information already available regarding who was tested and with all of that information that’s already available, for us to disclose the information that [l awmakers are asking for] could lead to the identification of individuals.”

Alferman said the Department’s argument that the information could lead to the identification of individuals is “ridiculous.”

Some senators on the conference committee wanted to restore what they called “drastic” cuts to DHSS, but Alferman and House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob) did not want to back down. Alferman had already agreed to reverse another of his amendments in response to the situation that shifted control of the state health lab from DHSS to the Department of Public Safety.

“I don’t know how I’m supposed to negotiate with someone who doesn’t come to the table,” said Alferman about the Department.

Fitzpatrick noted that Williams was once before at the center of a controversy with serious implications for public health.

In 2016 Williams, while the public health director for the State of North Carolina, joined another state official in rescinding a “do not drink” notice regarding well water potentially contaminated by coal ash. The state’s toxicologist at the time said North Carolina was telling people the water was safe when it knew it wasn’t, and went so far as to accuse other state officials of “playing down the risk.”

“It would just seem to indicate that there’s a pattern of behavior that Dr. Williams has made a controversial decision in the past,” said Fitzpatrick. “I just don’t think that allowing that to continue to happen in Missouri is a good idea.”

Democrats who opposed the cuts to DHSS noted the positions cut in the Director’s office would include the lawyers who interpret for the Department how it must act to comply with state and federal laws.

“I do find it concerning that when we ask the Department to interpret laws, both federal and state, and then they interpret it, if we disagree with their interpretation that we’re then going to cut their funding, of the very people who makes those interpretations,” said Springfield representative Crystal Quade (D). “We’re dealing with very sensitive information and very dangerous, life-threatening things, often, with these viruses, and it’s important that we are following the law accordingly so that we can make sure people are protected, so it was concerning to me that was the decision of the committee.”

Fitzpatrick noted that the cuts would remove 8 people from a department of more than 1,700 employees.

“I doubt those eight people are going to make it impossible for the mission of the Department of Health and Senior Services to be met. I think if anything, several of those people were part of obstructing the General Assembly from finding the information that I think [it’s] entitled to,” said Fitzpatrick.

Backers of the cuts said they are concerned about the safety of the public, and that includes Missourians knowing whether they should be concerned about a bourbon virus outbreak.

“I can’t go home and confidently tell my constituents that I believe that the state department of health is working on their behalf when they shut me out and shut all the members of the House out completely,” said Alferman.

The House and Senate are expected to vote Wednesday on the budget proposal for the fiscal year that begins July 1. The deadline for the legislature to submit a budget proposal to the governor is at the close of business on Friday.

Fitzpatrick said he would consider restoring the money for those positions if the Department gives the House the information it has asked for, but the next opportunity to do that would likely not come until work begins on a supplemental budget bill in January of 2019.

Earlier story: House Budget Committee adopts stiff cuts to DHSS over Bourbon virus data dispute

House members prepare for conference with Senate on FY ’19 budget

Missouri House budget leaders are preparing to confer with their counterparts in the state Senate about the two chambers’ respective budget proposals.

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (left) fields questions from reporters as House Speaker Todd Richardson (R-Poplar Bluff) listens. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

The House last month passed the 13 bills that make up the proposed state budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1. Its plan laid out more than $28-billion in spending. The Senate spent the last month going over that plan and making changes to it, and this week endorsed its own proposal totaling more than $28.6-billion. Now the two chambers will have to work out an agreement between the two versions that can be sent to the governor by May 11.

“[The Senate] spent a little more money than we did but I think that they have a good budget plan that is workable for conference,” said House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob).

Of the more than $570-million dollar difference between the two chambers’ spending plans, roughly $261-million comes from the Senate proposing spending in the Fiscal Year 2019 budget that the House plan would address in a supplemental budget early in calendar year 2019, when better data would be available on how much must be spent in some cases.

As far as the various components of the budget, Fitzpatrick said the greatest difference between the two chambers’ proposals in terms of dollars is in what each would spend on K-12 education. Full funding for the K-12 education formula in Fiscal Year 2019 would be about $99-million. The House proposed that, while the Senate took the position found in the governor’s budget proposal of spending $48-million.

“[The Senate] did use some of that money within House Bill 2002, which is the education budget bill, so we have the flexibility of moving some of that around,” said Fitzpatrick. “It’s not a secret that one of my top priorities is fully funding the [K-12 education funding] formula and keeping our commitment on the pre-K expansion that most of the members that are serving today made a few years ago, that once we fully funded the formula that that expansion would be available.”

The top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, Representative Kip Kendrick (Columbia), said the Senate’s proposal for K-12 education funding is concerning and House members would work to maintain its position on that.

“I was happy to hear the chairman of the committee, Representative Fitzpatrick, talking about making sure that we’re going to hold that line, and I can tell you that we’re going to do whatever we can to hold that line for the foundation formula to make sure that we get back to that $99-million mark,” said Kendrick.

One issue that has already been settled is that of higher education funding and limiting tuition increases at all but one of the state’s publicly-supported colleges and universities.

The House chose to restore $68-million to higher education support that the governor proposed cutting, but only if institutions agreed not to increase tuition by more than one-percent in fiscal year ’19. Those institutions agreed except for Missouri Southern in Joplin, which House members agreed is in a financial situation dire enough that they were allowed to opt out. The Senate proposal has upheld that plan.

“It wasn’t something that the House could do on [its] own so we appreciate the Senate working with us on accomplishing that,” said Fitzpatrick. “I think it will result in a positive outcome for the families and students who pay tuition in the State of Missouri.”

Kendrick is also glad to see that plan preserved but has some concern with the Senate breaking out funding for special initiatives at colleges and universities, which typically go toward projects including construction and expansion. The House had rolled the money for those items into the core allocation for institutions.

Representative Kip Kendrick is the ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

“Those received additional funds but I have concerns that those have been line-itemed back out rather than wrapped up in the core. [The House] moved them into core to protect those lines. We have some concerns that with them being separated out that they become more vulnerable for complete withholds or vetoes – just more vulnerable out there standing alone – so we’ll do what we can to move those back into the core,” said Kendrick.

Kendrick is also concerned about more than $4-million that the Senate proposed moving out of funding for treatment courts in Missouri – those are drug courts, mental health courts, and veterans courts.

“[Those are] services that have been proven very effective in reducing recidivism rates. The actual recidivism rate for an offender coming out DOC is about 50-percent recidivism; treatment courts is around 15-percent recidivism,” said Kendrick, who has personally worked with people going through mental health courts. “It does keep people out of prison. It keeps them in services, making sure that they are properly rehabilitated and receiving the services they need.”

Kendrick wants to see the House work to hold its position on the support for treatment courts.

Other differences between the House and Senate spending proposals that either Fitzpatrick or Kendrick highlighted concern funding in the social services budget for nursing homes; whether state-appropriated money can be used for DUI checkpoints; funding for autism services; and increases in state employee pay, including a Senate proposal to boost pay specifically for corrections officers – a proposal Fitzpatrick said the House would try to find a way to concur with.

Fitzpatrick will begin next week meeting with his Senate counterpart, Senator Dan Brown (R-Rolla), and each chamber will begin selecting members for committees that will meet to negotiate compromises on each of the 13 budget bills.

House budget committee votes to continue barring state funding for DUI checkpoints

The House Budget Committee has proposed a state spending plan that would continue to keep state-appropriated funds from going to impaired driving checkpoints.

Last year the House proposed that $20-million made available for grants to law enforcement agencies not be allowed for use in checkpoints. That proposal became part of the final budget plan for the fiscal year that began July 1, 2017. Law enforcement agencies can conduct checkpoints but have to find other ways to pay for them.

The idea was controversial but has the backing of House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob), who cited data from the Department of Transportation showing saturation efforts – periods of increased law enforcement patrols on the roads – result in more arrests per dollar.

Representative Kathie Conway (R-St. Charles) remains adamant in her opposition to the prohibition. She proposed letting $500,000 be used on checkpoints in the Fiscal Year 2019 budget, and argued that checkpoints are effective.

“Checkpoints are not really used to catch drunk drivers and impaired drivers. They’re mostly to make the public aware of the risk of being caught,” said Conway. “There’s been ten studies reported in five separate papers that the impact of sobriety checkpoints showed relative decrease in alcohol-related crash fatalities of 9-percent, and that’s just the fatalities. Two of these studies showed a decrease of 64-percent in one and 28-percent in the other of blood alcohol content above the legal limit.”

Those who supported barring state-appropriated funds from going to checkpoints last year stood by their decision. Representative Justin Hill (R-Lake St. Louis) said what’s happened in the last year shows it was correct.

“We were pretty confident last year when we spoke about focusing this fund to methods that work and actually remove drunk drivers off the road because after all, that is the goal – to arrest drunk drivers and get them off the road to make our roads safer,” said Hill. “In the first six months, without using these funds to use checkpoints, we saw an increase of 15-percent statewide in DWI arrests, and you know some may say that’s kind of a long shot to say that’s due to the lack of checkpoints, but I truly believe that sometimes this body has to make tough decisions to force the hand to do what not only is right, but to do what’s effective and efficient.”

Representative Peter Merideth (D-St. Louis) supported the partial opening up of state funds to checkpoints. He said he believes checkpoints are effective, at least when used in conjunction with other things like saturation efforts. He also believes checkpoints are fairer.

“What I would point out is that when we rely solely on individual officers pulling over individual vehicles we have significant research and evidence that those stops much more disproportionately impact poor and minority communities, and at the very least a checkpoint is a uniform way to check everybody fairly, regardless of your color, regardless of the type of car you drive,” said Merideth.

Representative Justin Hill (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

Many backers of the prohibition on state funds being used for checkpoints say checkpoints are unconstitutional because vehicles are stopped without probable cause. Yukon Republican Robert Ross said while he supports law enforcement and knows Conway does too, he said the issue is one of due process.

“Checkpoints are a system of being guilty until you can prove yourself innocent. That’s exactly counterintuitive to the way this country was set up and how we should operate,” said Ross.

The committee rejected Conway’s amendment. If that decision stands through the completion of a budget proposal for Fiscal Year 2019, the prohibition on state-appropriated funds being used for checkpoints would continue. Conway said she would continue to try to lift it.

“I’ve stood in crowds of 200 and 300 police officers that were going out to do saturation and/or DUI checkpoints. They’re very enthusiastic about their programs. I’ve stood and talked with parents and spouses and children of people that were killed by drunk driving and they’re very supportive of DUI checkpoints; in some places it’s up to a 70-percent approval of the citizens where checkpoints are used,” said Conway. “For some it simply boils down to a constitutional issue and their minds will not be changed, but I think it’s also – since it has been found constitutional under both Missouri and United States Supreme Courts – that until that changes we have to go with the constitutionality of it, and I must say that public safety is always at the forefront of most things that I do.”

The full House, when lawmakers return from spring break next week, will debate the proposal that was passed out of the chamber’s Budget Committee. The issue could be debated again then.

House budget committee adopts stiff cuts to DHSS over Bourbon virus data dispute

House Budget Committee leaders have proposed deep cuts to the office of the Department of Health and Senior Services’ director because the Department has not provided data on a recent virus outbreak that left a state employee dead.

Representative Justin Alferman (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House communications – click for larger version)

Committee Vice-Chairman Justin Alferman (R-Hermann) said prior to last week’s budget markup hearing that he would make such cuts if the information was not provided. The Department continued to stand by its argument that it cannot release the requested data without violating the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

Alferman’s proposal would cut more than $239-thousand in state revenue and another $925-thousand in federal funds from the director’s office. That represents the salaries of seven attorneys in the director’s office, the director, the assistant director, and the legislative liaison.

“We have very little resources at our disposal in order to put checks in with some of these departments, and one of the checks and balances is the power of the purse, and we are absolutely using it right here to get information for the six million Missourians who live in the state,” said Alferman.

Alferman and House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob) say the information they want – the number of people in Missouri who tested positive for the antibodies to the Bourbon virus, indicating they have had it – would not include specific patient information that would violate HIPAA.

A department spokesperson on Wednesday night told the House Budget Committee two people in Missouri have tested positive for Bourbon virus, but did not offer information on how many have tested positive for the antibodies. The superintendent of eastern Missouri’s Meramec State Park died last year after contracting the virus from a tick bite. Alferman said he wants to know whether there is a risk to public health from the tick-borne illness.

“All of the released information up until this point, 40-percent of all cases of the Bourbon virus have happened in Missouri, so for a state parks worker to pass away from this disease, I don’t think it’s an unrealistic expectation for us … we know testing was done. We want the results of that testing to know … we’re policy makers. Do we need to make a policy change in the state of Missouri to combat this virus? We don’t know because we’re not getting any information back from the Department,” said Alferman.

He said the Department’s rationale is that releasing the number of people tested could allow someone to question park employees about whether they were screened and use a process of elimination to identify who was and was not tested – something Alferman called a “ridiculous” interpretation.

Representative Peter Merideth (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

Democrats on the budget committee said while they might agree with Alferman about whether the Department should release that data, they don’t agree with cutting the department’s funding.

St. Louis Democrat Peter Merideth said the proposed cut could result in the firing of people in positions which work to enforce laws protecting Missouri’s seniors.

Merideth told a DHSS spokesperson, “I know that [Representative Alferman] has said that he is not trying to be punitive with this but it strikes me as that is all this is. It is punishing you for something that you did that you shouldn’t have done … Maybe there is a very real complaint here that we should have gotten more information from you on a timely basis, but I don’t see how this cut to your budget actually helps address the problem and it looks to me like all it actually does is hurts the people of our state.”

Other Republicans, however, agreed with Alferman. Representative Don Rone (R-Portageville) told the DHSS spokesperson that with as long as this issue has been developing, the DHSS’ director should have been in front of the committee and not a spokesperson. The director was instead in the nation’s capital that night.

“There’s nothing can be, in Washington D.C., any more important than letting the citizens of this state know that if there is a problem … we’ve got a job to do here and that is protect the people of the state of Missouri, and it’s not right that the director is not here, sitting here, taking these questions,” said Rone.

Alferman’s proposed cut was adopted as part of the committee’s budget proposal, which the committee has voted to send to the House floor. It will be debated there next week when lawmakers return from spring break.

House budget leader has plan to restore higher ed funding, but wants agreement on tuition first

The Missouri House budget committee has a plan to continue funding of Missouri’s colleges and universities at the amount budgeted last year, but in exchange lawmakers want those institutions to freeze tuition.

Representative Scott Fitzpatrick (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob) said the solution comes from money the state set aside for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). Because federal funding for the program was uncertain, the state set aside funds for CHIP. Now that federal funding has come through, Fitzpatrick has said the state could restore all $68-million that Governor Eric Greitens (R) proposed cutting from higher education.

Fitzpatrick said full restoration is his goal, but he is seeking agreement from the state’s institutions that they will hold down tuition.

“I want to make sure that if we’re putting that money back it’s going to result in holding down the cost of college for Missouri students, so I’m in the process of trying to seek a deal on holding down tuition with the institutions in the state in exchange for making a full restoration,” said Fitzpatrick. “So far that deal has not been agreed to and so what we did was we put, out of the $68-million we took $30-million of that, which is the amount that it takes to fully fund the Access Missouri Scholarship, which is the state’s need-based scholarship program, and we fully funded that scholarship because if tuition is going to go up I want to make sure that we are putting some of that money into a place where it’ll help the people that are having to pay that tuition offset it.”

Fitzpatrick told the rest of the committee that if the institutions agree to his plan he will put that $30-million back toward their state support. If they don’t agree, he will leave that $30-million where it is and might move some of the remaining $38-million to other things.

“My goal is to help the institutions out but I also want that to translate into the cost of college being held down, and I don’t plan to seek an agreement that tuition won’t be raised every single year but I do think if we’re going to be spending close to $70-million on just going back into institutional budgets that there should be some consideration for that,” said Fitzpatrick.

The leading Democrat on the House Budget Committee, Kip Kendrick (Columbia), said he’s still undecided on whether he supports the chairman’s proposed agreement, but he thinks the committee’s members all want to see tuition as level as possible and keep higher education affordable for Missourians.

“It’s hard to make an argument against fully funding the only needs-based scholarship program we have in the state of Missouri,” said Kendrick. “Access Missouri provides access, as it says – it’s in the name. It provides access to many Missourians – middle-class and lower-income individuals – to higher education. It’s an important program, it’s been underfunded for a number of years, so it’s hard to necessarily argue with where it currently stands.”

Kendrick said he hopes before the budget is final money could be found to both restore core funding to colleges and universities and to fully fund Access Missouri.

The budget committee will go through it’s “mark up” process next week. Individual members of the committee will propose changes they want to make – to increase funding where they think it should be increased and propose where that funding could be pulled from. From there, the committee will vote on whether to send each budget bill to debate by the full House, which is expected to happen after the legislature’s spring break.

Budget subcommittee chair to recommend delay in basing college, university funding on performance

The Chair of the House subcommittee that deals with education funding says he will recommend the legislature put off a performance-based funding mechanism for state-supported colleges and universities.

University of Missouri System President Mun Choi testifies to the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Education on January 31, 2018. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Cedarcreek Republican Lyle Rowland’s subcommittee heard from those institutions’ presidents over the course of two days and said many of them wanted the same things: a delay in implementation of that plan, and a restoration of their core funding.

The state budget proposed last month by Governor Eric Greitens (R) would cut higher education funding by 10-percent, or roughly $100-million, from its Fiscal Year 2018 level. Also in early January, the Coordinating Board for Higher Education approved linking 10-percent of funding for publicly-backed colleges and universities to performance factors such as students’ job placement, degree completion, and budgetary practices. The model would look back at institutions’ performance over the past three years.

The combination means it is possible, though unlikely, that any given institution could see a decrease of as much as 20-percent in year-to-year state support.

Rowland said he agrees with the institution presidents who told him implementing performance-based funding now puts them at a disadvantage.

“[Institutions] didn’t know what their standards were going to be. They didn’t know how to change their operation of their colleges and universities to help meet those goals,” said Rowland. “With them not knowing what standards were, what those areas of concern are going to be, they have no way of implementing it, so it was going to hurt them financially. We don’t want to hurt them financially.”

He wants to postpone that plan for three years so that institutions will know what areas to work on before their support is tied to them.

“We want to give them the opportunity to build up before we start with the funding model and then let’s put x-amount of new dollars into performance funding then and if you’re not meeting it you’re not going to get all of that funding. We’re going to redistribute that to the other schools and universities.”

Rowland’s panel on Wednesday heard from University of Missouri System President Mun Choi, who touted to lawmakers the system’s accomplishments but coupled that with words of caution.

He said 90-percent of Mizzou’s students found a job within six months or moved on to graduate school; research is yielding advancements in the agriculture and medical fields; and Missouri S&T last summer beat out other universities from around the world in a competition to design a Mars rover.

“Those kinds of stories are peppered throughout all of our campuses but our ability to continue these programs is in jeopardy because of the cuts that we’ve experienced,” said Choi.

Lincoln University Interim President Michael Middleton echoed Choi’s call for a restoration of core funding and a delay in the performance model.

Representative Lyle Rowland (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

“We are about as lean as we can be. We’re already seeing that giving multiple responsibilities to individuals affects our productivity, which I believe is reflected in the number of students we’re able to recruit and retain,” said Middleton. “With this [proposed] additional wave of cuts we are in a perfect storm with no clear break in the clouds.”

As for the proposed cut to core funding, Rowland said the governor’s proposal is not likely to stand, but given the state’s overall economic picture some reduction is probable.

“I’m sure there will be some cuts. What we’re trying to do is try to make it as little as possible,” said Rowland. “We’re hoping to be able to locate some things [elsewhere in the state budget] that we might be able to transfer into higher ed.”

The ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee, Kip Kendrick (Columbia), has been one of several lawmakers expressing concern about the timing of performance-based funding. He thinks most legislators will agree it should be pushed back.

“Higher education institutions across the board were on the same message about this, whether they were going to receive an additional hit from the performance funding model or not,” said Kendrick. “Everybody was very tepid in having that implemented in a year where there is a potential for up to 10-percent of additional cuts to higher education. We can’t penalize institutions on top of the additional cuts that they’re receiving this year. It’s way too punitive and not the right year to implement it.”

Rowland will submit his recommendation to the full budget committee. That committee will develop its own state budget proposal to be considered by the full House. Eventually the House and Senate will have to agree on a state spending plan to be sent to the governor.