House proposal could close missing persons cases, finally giving answers to families

     For more than four decades, two Missouri families have been among an untold number who are going through the anguish of not knowing what happened to a loved one who simply vanished.  Backers of a proposal coming before a House committee this week say its passage could be the key to immediate answers in those cases and many more, not just in Missouri but nationwide. 

Geneva Verneal Adams has been missing since 1976.

     “I still have hope.  I still hope we can get something done,” Steve Crump said.  He has never stopped looking for his mother, who has been missing for 47 years.  

     53-year-old Geneva Verneal Adams usually didn’t go out at night, and she didn’t drink, but she loved to dance, so on July 14, 1976, she asked her daughter to go out with her.  Lonely after her first husband had died and a second marriage ended in divorce, she was smiling big when she left, hoping to have a fun night out. 

     Her daughter decided to call it a night early, but Adams was enjoying dancing with a man she’d met at the Artesian Lounge in Herculaneum and opted to stay.  Adams left the bar with him around 1 the next morning.  What happened to her after that has never been known.

     Crump, who was 17 when his mother went missing, has never given up looking.  Many years and many disappointments later, a police officer – the son of one of the original detectives on his mother’s case – gave him another glimmer of hope.  He had learned of a body that had been found just weeks after his mother disappeared and in the same general area, went unidentified, and was buried not far away in Illinois.  Many of its characteristics matched those of his mother, and it was going to be exhumed to see if this was Geneva. 

     When the grave was opened, it was empty. 

     Some 90 miles away and three years after Geneva disappeared, 19-year-old Cheryl Anne Scherer called home from her job at a small self-service gas station in Scott City.  She talked to her mother about what would be served for dinner that night and some sewing Scherer planned to do when she got home.  Authorities can account for all but ten minutes of what went on after that phone call, and in that ten-minute window, something happened to Scherer and her family never heard from her again.

Cheryl Scherer in 1977, and an age-progressed photo of how she might appear today.

     More than 14 years passed before Diane Scherer-Morris accepted that her sister might never come. 

     “I can attest to my dad sitting on the stair steps, because the phone was next to the, going up the stairs, and just sitting there and sobbing sometimes because he just wanted that phone to ring … but we never got the phone call that it was her, or that they’d found her,” Diane told House Communications. 

     Both of these are families holding on to hope, and both of them could stand another chance of finally getting closure through the passage of House Bill 1716. 

     Both are asking lawmakers to give them that chance. 

     HB 1716 would require that all law enforcement agencies in Missouri participate in the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, better known as NamUs.  It is a nationwide database of cases of missing persons and unidentified human remains.  Each case entry might include physical descriptions or DNA evidence, or both. 

     That database was launched in 2007.  The more data is entered, the more open cases of unidentified bodies and missing persons can be advanced and even solved, and more families like those of Geneva Adams and Cheryl Scherer can finally get answers. 

     Many law enforcement agencies, however, still don’t enter their information on such cases into that database.  Only 12 states require that the agencies within their borders participate.  By proposing HB 1716, Representative Tricia Byrnes (R-Wentzville) wants to bring Missouri into the fold.  

     “Really it’s an awareness bill.  It’s going to create awareness that this tool is available because if everyone participates, the data becomes more reliable,” Byrnes said.  “The more states that can come on board, the better off the entire country of finding missing persons will be, because we won’t have these holes across the country.”

     NamUs currently records that there are about 120 unidentified bodies in Missouri, but the real number is likely far greater. 

     “We don’t know what that unidentified person’s number will climb to once we all work to one database.  We do know that number will go up, we just don’t know what it will go to,” Byrnes said. 

     Getting all Missouri agencies to participate in NamUs would not only lead to answers in this state but anywhere in the U.S.   Data in the System has resulted in connections that span multiple states, such as when a body found in 1982 in Arizona was just three years ago identified as that of a teen who disappeared from St. Louis in 1981.  That case remains unsolved, but her family was “awestruck” to finally know what happened.

     Cheryl Scherer’s brother, Anthony, said he is more than ready for his family to also get an answer.  For these long decades, he has considered the numerous theories that have been proposed about what happened, including that Cheryl was a victim of notorious serial killers Ottis Toole and Henry Lee Lucas, who authorities say were operating in the region at the time.      

     “It could be anything,” Anthony Scherer said.  “[Maybe] a local person might have had something to do with it and has been holding it all these years.  One of the things that we stress when we have get-togethers is the conscience part of it, that they’re getting toward the end of their life and that maybe one day they’re just going to have to get something off their conscience and say something they know or admit to doing something.  As far as that, that’s the best answer I can say because there’s just not a whole lot to go on.”

     Steve Crump wants this bill to pass so that other families might be spared the years and years of pain he experienced.  He still thinks his answer could be found with the body that was supposed to be in that Illinois grave. 

     “Everything matched … she [had] brown hair, hazel eyes, they had all this information about this woman.  The coroner said she was in between 30 and 60, so our mom would fall in there,” Crump said about just some of the details that matched.  “We got our hopes up.  Oh my gosh, I really thought that this was it, we’re going to find her.”

     Geneva Adams’ case is a perfect example of why more agencies need to get active with NamUs, according to Courtney Nelson, Board Member and Advocate of the Missouri Persons Support Center. 

     She said if the System had been in place in 1976, authorities might have sooner made the connection between that body and Adams’ disappearance.  Instead, it wasn’t made until 2018, and poor documentation appears to have led to digging up the wrong grave.

     “We can avoid all of that by really utilizing NamUs,” Nelson said.

     Nelson is one among those who brought the idea to Rep. Byrnes.  She said passing HB 1716 would send a message to families like those of Geneva Adams and Cheryl Scherer, that law enforcement still cares and hasn’t forgotten.

     “Everybody deserves to be found and put to rest, or just found, in general.  If there is an unidentified person, there is a family out there wondering where they’re at or looking for them, and I just think having law enforcement take the time to really care and add all of this information in there is really going to revitalize the hope for these families that have been waiting for so long,” Nelson said. 

Click here at 4pm Wednesday, February 7, to see the hearing on HB 1716

     HB 1716 will be the subject of a hearing by the House Committee on Emerging Issues, on Wednesday at 4:00.  The hearing can be watched live through the House website, but Rep. Byrnes is calling on those concerned with missing persons to come and testify or submit testimony online.

     “When there’s people that show up to show this matters to Missourians it makes it much easier for lawmakers to solve a problem, and I know this matters to Missourians, it matters to law enforcement, and everyone that’s involved in the cases of unidentified people and missing persons, and we need them to show up at 4:00 on Wednesday.”

     Crump said if HB 1716 passes, his family might at last get to do one simple thing for his mother.  

     “We could have a funeral service.  We’ve never had a funeral service for her, and have that closure … I just think that it would be awesome, fighting for all these years and [to have] finally found her.”

     Scherer-Morris and her brother hope for the same thing. 

     “We actually have a tombstone and [Cheryl’s] is between mom and dad’s, so my ultimate goal before I die,” Scherer-Morris struggles to say as the tears come, “and I think we all feel this way, is that we just want to find her and give her a chance to lay next to mom and dad.  She didn’t deserve this.  She missed out on a lot of life and we missed out on having her in our lives, so the ultimate goal would just be [to be] able to find her and lay her to rest between mom and dad.  I just feel like that’s what we owe, to keep trying to find, for her.  We have to keep being her voice, we have to keep being her advocate because she can’t do that for herself.”

HB 1716 would also require additional training for law enforcement on unidentified and missing persons cases; require that fingerprints from unidentified remains be submitted to the Highway Patrol and that a dental examination must be performed on remains; and that an unidentified person record in NamUs be created within 30 days of the discovery of such remains.

VIDEO: Law mandating maintenance for children whose parents die in DUI crashes conceived in Missouri, has gone global, still proposed here

Laws are being passed or considered in multiple states and other nations which require those who kill parents while driving drunk to pay restitution to surviving children.  Now the woman who is the driving force behind the idea says it’s time for it to be enacted where it began:  Missouri.

Mason and Bentley Williams (Photo courtesy: Cecelia Williams)

      In April 2021, in Jefferson County, a drunk driver caused an accident that killed 24-year-old Lacey Newton, 30-year-old Cordell Williams, and four-month-old Cordell Williams, Jr., of Bonne Terre.  The couple left behind two surviving children, Bentley and Mason, now being cared for by Cordell’s mother, Cecelia Williams.

      Williams soon began crafting what has become known as “Bentley and Mason’s Law,” or more commonly “Bentley’s Law.”  It would require people who are convicted of killing a parent or parents while driving drunk to pay child support for the care of surviving children. 

      In the Missouri House, it is being sponsored for the third year by Representative Mike Henderson (R-Bonne Terre), in House Bill 1958.

      “What we’re saying is, these people … should have responsibility, and we’re trying to use many of the same guidelines for determining that child support as you would for in a divorce situation.”

      Williams on Wednesday told the members of the House Judiciary Committee, “This bill is not only about paying that restitution.  This bill is about people understanding that there are true consequences to one’s actions, and when we add on the extra consequences of that child maintenance, we’re sending a message that you cannot just get in a vehicle and kill people.”

      Henderson said in the wake of crashes of this nature, surviving children are left in many different situations. 

      “Sometimes there’s one parent left, sometimes there’s none.  Sometimes they end up with their grandparents, aunts, uncles, or … they end up as a ward of the state in many instances.”

      Williams said that some who have found themselves in her position, aren’t able to raise the surviving children, and their trauma is multiplied.

Representative Mike Henderson (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      “I listened to a lady from New York … she said, ‘I don’t know what to do.  I’m going to lose my grandson.’  She suffered so much because her family died and she had to give her grandson to the state because she could not afford him.  She’s on a fixed income … to this day it kills her.  She died all over again.  She died the day that her family was killed, she died that day too, and she’ll die every single day that she wakes up.”

      The committee also heard from the mother of 23-year-old Racheal Grace Neldon, who was one of four people killed in an accident she says was caused by a drunk driver in April of last year.  Jennifer Neldon told the committee while this bill wouldn’t help her family, it could be a deterrent to at least some people who would drive drunk.

      “This bill may be specific towards children when their parents are killed and my story is obviously different, but there are no survivors to charge, no court cases to sit through, but the advocacy and demand for change is still the same.  This is a public health crisis and we as a society need to stand up and do something about it.”

      Of the places that have enacted this policy, Williams said, “The bill passed in Tennessee in 2022.  In 2023 it passed in Kentucky, Maine, and Texas.  We have bills that are called ‘Bentley’s Law’ overseas … I received a call in the middle of the night from a news station in Korea.  On March 17 of 2023, Bentley’s Act was introduced in Korea.  This bill, now, is in Puerto Rico … we also have a bill in Guam.”

      She told the committee she will testify in March before the Parliament of Canada, where such a law is being considered.

      “This bill started here in Missouri, my hometown, my home state, and I would really love to see this bill pass where it started.  It is needed here.  Missouri has a problem and we need to fix it.”

      The Committee’s chairman, Representative David Evans (R-West Plains), told Williams, “Certainly it is a tragedy; soul-piercing sadness, the brief little bit of understanding we have of what you’ve gone through, but on the other hand the uplifting and courage you’ve shown, the dedication to try to use that experience that you’ve gone through to, and literally have, change the laws, change the people of the world.  That’s quite amazing, what you have done.”

      The committee is expected to vote soon on Bentley and Mason’s Law.

See Cecelia Williams’ testimony to the House Judiciary Committee below:

House effort to offer more, and cheaper, child care advanced by committee

A proposal aimed at expanding child care in Missouri, which received broad House support last year, is among the earliest of bills to be approved by a House committee this year.

Representative Brenda Shields (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      Numerous supporters, including many from Missouri’s business organizations, testified at the hearing about what they say is a crisis facing the state’s employers and, therefore, the state as a whole.

      “Perhaps the single greatest barrier to workforce participation today is the lack of child care resources,” said the chairman of the Workforce and Infrastructure Development Committee, Representative Louis Riggs (R-Hannibal). 

      Representative Brenda Shields’s (R-St. Joseph) House Bill 1488 would create three new tax credits, one of which is for employers who help fund child care for their employees, and one that is for providers who boost their employees’ salaries or improve their facilities. 

      “It addresses Missouri’s workforce crisis by addressing the root problem:  the lack of affordable, quality, reliable, safe child care for working families,” Shields said.     

Shields told the committee that 58 percent of businesses in Missouri report that child care is a barrier to recruiting employees, and 63 percent say it is a barrier to retaining employees.  Parents says child care is often unavailable, and 43 percent of them say when it is, it is unaffordable.

      She said her proposal would let communities respond to these issues in whatever ways best suit their needs.

      “It is local businesses, churches, family homes, group homes who will create the child care that they need in their community,” Shields said.

      Besides the economic issues, Shields said improving child care throughout Missouri would mean improving the lives of children in the state and offering stability to more of them.  

      “[Having] reliable people in a child’s life is important.  We have to stop the revolving door of workers in our child care facilities.”

      The proposed Child Care Contribution Tax Credit would be for up to 75 percent of a contribution used to improve a child care provider’s facility, equipment, or services, or to improve the salaries of a facilities’ staff.  The Employer Provided Child Care Assistance Tax Credit would be for up to 30 percent of child care expenditures paid by an employer.  The Child Care Providers Tax Credit would be for up to 30 percent of the cost of improvements made by providers, such as facility or service expansion or employee raises.

      Each program would be capped at $200,000 per taxpayer, and $20 million overall, however an additional fifteen percent would be allowed in areas considered “child care deserts,” regions of the state with the most acute discrepancies between children in need of care and availabilities.   

      In testifying about the high price of child care, Kara Corches with the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry said that care for her one child last year cost more than $21,000.  Upon hearing this, Representative Travis Wilson (R-St. Charles) said, “That’s with one child, so if a family has two children, even if they got a multi-child discount at a child care provider, they could still be looking at, say, $30,000 a year.  I think that kind of makes the case all on its own.”

      Corches said providers are not to blame.

      “Their margins are extremely narrow.  It is very costly, if you think about liability insurance you have to have when you’re watching the lives of that many children, just supplies, etcetera, so it is a complicated situation where child care providers are struggling to make ends meet but they can’t just raise rates because then parents can’t afford it.”

      One provider with three facilities in the Jefferson City area, Nicci Rexroat, told the committee, “We’re talking about middle class families with two kids who are paying $35,000 a year for early childhood [care].  We can’t raise our rates any more and our staff are still making well below what they deserve.”

      “I know it was mentioned before that it’s the hope that we will reinvest in our employees, and for me and other child care providers it is the plan,” Rexroat said.

      Emily van Schenkhof with The Missouri Children’s Trust Fund, which works to prevent child abuse, reminded the legislators that the issue isn’t just about the workforce and the economy.

      “When families aren’t able to meet their basic needs, families become more stressed out.  Whenever stress increases in families, bad things happen to kids, and so this child care crisis … is harming Missouri families and it’s harming Missouri children.”

      “All children deserve to have access to safe, quality child care and that is something that we are not doing right now,” van Schenkhof said.

      Shields told the committee Missouri can afford these tax credits. 

      “It is estimated that Missouri’s economy last year lost $1.35 billion because we didn’t have enough workers.  If we collected the tax on those employees … that’d be $280-million,” Shields told her fellows. 

      She noted that when the state tries to get businesses to come here, it touts its location, its access to multiple modes of transportation, and its infrastructure, but businesses want to know that they will be able to find employees, and that those employees’ ability to work will be supported.

      “I truly believe if we solve the child care crisis … businesses will flock to our state,” Shields said.

      Last year’s version of Shields’ legislation was voted out of the House 133-20 but it stalled in the Senate.  She hopes it will fare better this year.

      “I think the time is now.  I think it’s time that we do this for our parents and that we do this for our businesses.  We can’t continue to kick this can down the road.”

      The committee this week voted 10-0 to advance Shields’ bill.

Missouri House legislative effort to stem veteran suicide continues

      Veteran suicide is an issue the Missouri House of Representatives has sought to address for some time, and in the past year it touched the life of the man who has led that effort.  He entered the 2024 legislative session with renewed passion to see his legislation become law. 

      The House last year voted 156-0 in support of requiring the Missouri Veterans Commission to come up with recommendations on how veteran suicide can be prevented; and to report annually on new recommendations, and the implementation and effectiveness of state efforts.  That bill was approved 8-0 by a Senate committee but did not reach passage in that chamber.  This year the proposal is back, and is one of the first House measures to get a committee hearing.

      Representative Dave Griffith (R-Jefferson City) is the sponsor of House Bill 1495.  He is a U.S. Army Veteran and the chairman of the House Veterans Committee, which held that hearing. 

      “It’s a topic that is near and dear to my heart.  It’s one that I feel like … we’re not making a great deal of success and progress in preventing suicide,” Griffith told his colleagues. 

      “I don’t know how many of you on this committee have been affected personally by veteran suicide, but this past year I lost a really, really good friend of mine to suicide.  He was a post-911 veteran, Iraqi and Afghan veteran.  He had some issues, and I had talked with him a week-and-a-half before he committed suicide, and to be honest with you, I had no idea there was something going on with him.”

      Griffith said Missouri agencies are actively working to stem veteran suicide.

      “I do want to commend [Missouri Veterans Commission Executive] Director Paul Kirchoff and his staff.  Even though the bill has not passed, they’re doing a lot of this data and this due diligence right now, and so I really appreciate what he’s done and the work that his staff are doing to try and look at veterans suicide and what we can do.”

      Kerchoff told the committee the data on suicide rates has not been encouraging.

      “Suicide rates in Missouri continue to be high … active duty suicides are the highest since the great depression.  In 2019 there were 188 veteran suicides, 2020 there were 174 in Missouri, and Missouri is significantly higher than the national average for veterans,” Kerchoff said.  “Our rate [of veteran suicides] is 45.2 per 100,000, but to give you the national average is just 33.9, so Missouri’s is significantly higher than the national average.”

      Asked why the rate in Missouri exceeds the national average, Kerchoff said the answer isn’t known, and that’s one more reason why he wants to see HB 1495 pass. 

      “We can guess at it but I’d like to know through facts, and without having an emphasis on this, we just won’t know.”

Representative Dave Griffith (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      Kerchoff said the issues that impact the mental health of veterans require specialized understanding and approaches. 

      “Mental health is not just a veterans’ issue, it’s a nationwide issue, but it does effect veterans at a higher rate than the average person.  Why?  Because there’s a military stigma against seeking help … There’s a reason why veterans don’t want to seek help.”

      Representative Jim Schulte (R-New Bloomfield), in speaking to the stigmas facing veterans seeking mental health help, talked about a friend who did get treatment.  He was then, initially, denied reentry to the National Guard because he’d sought treatment.

      “We’ve got to overcome this stigma.  We tell everybody we’ve got these help lines, we have these programs, but they’re leery of every doing them because then we stigmatize them and label them,” said Schulte.  “In the name of, we say we want to help, we’re putting a badge on them that’s not a positive thing.”

      A number of state agencies, including the Missouri House, have worked to drive up awareness of the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, and Griffith said that remains one of the best resources available for those seeking help.

      “The number of calls that we’re getting in the State of Missouri has far exceeded what they ever thought it would.  In the first month they had over 20,000 calls,” Griffith told the committee.

      Griffith and the staff of House Communications spent time this past summer creating a series of public service announcements for radio, television, and social media that target suicide and specifically veteran suicide.  Those will soon be available for circulation. 

      The Veterans Committee voted unanimously to advance HB 1495.  

House Republicans and Democrats agree: FRA must pass

      One thing Republicans and Democrats in the Missouri House agree on is that the legislature must renew Federal Reimbursement Allowance (FRA) legislation this year, or a massive hole will be blown out of the state’s operating budget.

House Speaker Dean Plocher and Minority Floor Leader Crystal Quade agree the legislature must pass an FRA extension this year. (Photos: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      The FRA has been passed 17 times since 1992.  It is a tax paid by Medicaid providers in Missouri which the federal government more than matches in paying it back to the state.  That helps to cover the MO HealthNet program, and additional allowances also cover nursing facilities, pharmacy costs, and ambulance services.

      House Speaker Dean Plocher (R-St. Louis) said failing to renew the FRA this year “would result in an almost 3.5 to 4-billion dollar hit to our annual state budget.  I ask you [to join me] in passing the FRA because we simply cannot let Missourians down.”

      House Democrat leader Crystal Quade (D-Springfield) agreed, “If we do not pass the FRA we will be out so much money, and where is that money going to come from?  Public education, general revenue, and so when we have the conversation about the FRA it’s not just about making our Medicaid program solvent, it’s about making sure that we are funding all of the things necessary.”

      For many years legislators described FRA renewals as non-controversial, but Quade pointed out that was not the case in 2021.

      “It is deeply concerning.  The last time the FRA was up we weren’t able to get it done [during the regular session].  We had to go to a special session,” Quade said during a media conference on the opening day of the 2024 session.

      Plocher, asked during the Republicans’ media conference about the importance of FRA renewal, responded with his own question, “How vital is 3.5 to 4-billion dollars on a $50-billion budget?  If we don’t get it passed I don’t think our budget can absorb a 3.5 to 4-billion dollar hit.  I think it’s important.  We passed it a couple of years ago.  I look forward to tackling that issue now, but I don’t think we can’t afford not to pass it.”

      The current FRA expires at the end of September.   

Blair’s Law against ‘celebratory gunfire’ back for 2024 session

      For the twelfth time, Missouri legislators will be asked by the mother of a little girl killed by a stray bullet to increase penalties for the careless firing of guns. 

Blair Shanahan Lane

      The legislature this past session sent “Blair’s Law” to the desk of Governor Mike Parson (R).  It was the first time that proposal reached the desk of a governor.  Parson expressed support for it calling it something he’d “like to sign into law,” but it was only one measure among several that were combined into one bill, Senate Bill 189.  He had issues with some of the other measures, and so it was vetoed. 

      Blair’s Law is named for Blair Shanahan Lane, who was 11 when she was hit by a stray bullet while celebrating Independence Day, 2011, with her family.  Someone more than half a mile away carelessly fired their gun into the air and one of those bullets struck Blair in the neck.  She died the next day. 

      The man who fired that gun served 18 months in prison for involuntary manslaughter.  No state law directly addresses what is often called, “celebratory gunfire.”  Every legislative session Blair’s death, her mother has come to Jefferson City to change that. 

      Michele Shanahan DeMoss said since Blair’s Law was vetoed, after being passed for the first time after more than a decade of work, she has been, “thoughtful. 

      “Thoughtful that I know the processes.  I knew that in July [when the governor vetoed that bill] the process had already started again.  The conversations were happening.  Just thoughtful that the wheels are turning and we’re headed in the right direction.”

      The “processes” to which she refers are the renewed efforts to see Blair’s Law become part of Missouri law.  That is a top priority for two state lawmakers, and that is why the proposal was again among those prefiled on December 1; the first day that bills could be filed for the 2024 session.

      One of those legislators is Representative Mark Sharp (D), who will be carrying that proposal for the fifth straight year.  He said even though it was vetoed, he and other supporters see its passage last year as a win.

      “The House has vetted it as much as it can … I believe this is the second session in a row where the Senate has had debate on Blair’s Law on the Senate floor.  That’s a long way away from where we were four or five years ago with Blair’s Law, so I do think that all indicators are pointing the right direction.”

Representative Mark Sharp (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      Joining the list of legislators who over the years have sponsored Blair’s Law is Belton Republican Sherri Gallick, who is in her second year in the Missouri House.  Gallick met DeMoss while campaigning in 2022 and that’s when she first heard Blair’s story.

      “I was knocking on doors for campaigns … and happened to knock on Blair’s mother’s door and she told me all about it, and by the time we were leaving we were all in tears, so when Mark (Sharp) filed it last year I had told him … ‘I will do whatever I can to help you.’”

      Gallick said of DeMoss, “She has been steadfast … there’s been other legislators throughout the years that have tried to help and she’s still very adamant.  She wants to do this.  She wants to get it across the finish line for her daughter.”

      House Bills 1437 (Gallick) and 1477 (Sharp) would specify that a person is guilty of unlawful discharge of a firearm if they, with criminal negligence, discharge a firearm in or into the limits of a municipality.  A first offense would be a class “A” misdemeanor which carries up to a year in jail and a fine of up to $2,000; a second time would be a class “E” felony carrying up to four years in prison; and third and any subsequent offense would be a class “D” felony, punishable by up to seven years in prison.

      Even as efforts to pass Blair’s Law continue, incidents involving stray gunfire keep happening.  Last month, while in her own bedroom in her south Kansas City home, 11 year-old Lauren Reddick was hit by two bullets.  One of those left her paralyzed.

      On New Year’s Eve, the Department’s SoundSpotter system identified more than 2,300 rounds fired between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. on January 1.  That was more than double the total detected by that sound capturing technology one year prior. 

      “We’re all gearing up for New Year’s and Christmas and the holidays and … I just hope to God that we don’t have any more incidents of somebody being hit or injured or killed by celebratory gunfire,” Sharp said.

      Over the years that Blair’s Law has been proposed, the attention it has gotten has created awareness of the dangers presented by careless gunfire, and its supporters hope that will continue to be a residual benefit of their efforts.

      “It is absolutely unbelievable, the places I go, not even in Missouri, that either somebody will learn the story, recognize me, somebody else will tell them, and a conversation [will begin] with regards to celebratory gunfire, firing a gun recklessly, and unfortunately even other tragic situations, because of the conversation continuing and that really is the biggest thing that I share,” DeMoss said.  “Year after year it would be nice to cross the finish line, have it signed into law and see the goodness that really transpires from it.  Raising the awareness is one thing but being able to actually prosecute the crime would, I think, be the game changer.”

Representative Sherri Gallick (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      Gallick, like other Republicans who have carried or spoken in support of the legislation through the years, says among other things it is an issue of responsible gun ownership. 

      “When you shoot a gun the bullet goes somewhere … you should be intentional.  When you’re shooting a gun you should have some purpose, not just to shoot it in the air,” Gallick said.

      Both representatives say they are optimistic about the legislation’s chances of passage in 2024, given its overwhelming bipartisan support and the Governor’s message.  They also commend DeMoss, who they say is “inspiring” as she has remained consistent and undaunted.

      “There are so many people that think I should be devastated that it didn’t pass and I’m not devastated,” said DeMoss.  “There are so many disappointments that I could list but … the worst things that could happen to a human being happened to Blair and changed my life forever, and I will continue lobbying.  I will continue educating, carrying on the conversation that celebratory gunfire, firing a gun recklessly is stupidity.  To continue to persevere to change the law, to make the law what we’ve been working on absolutely needs to be done.”

      The new session of the Missouri General Assembly begins January 3.

House plan would stabilize Missourians’ vehicle property tax values

      Missourians in recent years have been slapped with high and increasing property tax bills for their vehicles, and state lawmakers are going to try again this year to stem that.

Representative Rodger Reedy (Photo: TIm Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      The issue has been a top one for two legislators who were assessors before they came to Jefferson City.   

      One of them is Representative Rodger Reedy (R-Windsor), who sees his House Bill 1690 as a taxpayer protection act.

      “We are trying to do this to make it better for our taxpayers and to be more fair to them,” Reedy said.

      The other is Representative Brad Hudson (R-Cape Fair), who said when he was an assessor, “I would have never wanted to sit across the desk from someone and say, ‘Hey, you know that farm truck that you’ve got?  Yeah, it’s a year older, yeah it’s got more miles on it, but I’m going to hit you with a higher assessment this year and you’re going to have to pay more in property taxes because of that.’  That doesn’t make sense.  It’s not right.”

      The issue with vehicle valuations began in 2020 when the COVID pandemic halted supply lines.  Parts for vehicles were harder to come by this inflated the demand for, and therefore the values of, used vehicles.

      “So what the end result has been, you would have the same vehicle and it would be a year older but the trade-in value would show to be higher, so your assessment would be higher and you would pay more taxes on that vehicle that’s a year older,” Reedy explained.  “I basically, fundamentally think that if that vehicle’s a year older, typically you’ve got 20-30 thousand more miles on it, you should not be paying more taxes on it than you did the year before.”

      Hudson agreed, “Around COVID with supply chain issues, things going on, there was just this perfect storm that created what some would call a ‘funky market,’ or a ‘false market,’ and that actually put assessors in a position where if they were going to do their job according to state statute, many of them felt like they would have to be raising the assessed value of vehicles.”

      The state statute to which Hudson refers dictates that assessors must use the October issue of the National Automobile Dealers Association’s (NADA) Used Car Guide to determine the value of a motor vehicle.  Reedy’s bill would allow the State Tax Commission to designate a different nationally produced automobile guide to be used by assessors.  His proposal would also establish a depreciation schedule to be applied to the values set forth in that automobile guide.   

Representative Brad Hudson (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      “It makes sure that these used vehicles depreciate in value for taxation purposes,” Reedy said. 

      Hudson said the issue of inflated vehicle valuations has the potential to negatively impact every household in Missouri.

      “People from all over our state pay personal property taxes, and in many cases they pay a lot in personal property taxes, and they expect their taxes to go up when they get a new vehicle … but when they have the same vehicles, when those vehicles are older, when those vehicles have more miles on them, they don’t expect their taxes to go up because of their vehicles’ value, and they shouldn’t have to.  It’s just common sense that these vehicles should be going down in value every year,” Hudson said.

      Reedy said the problem hasn’t abated on its own the passage of time, “I can give you a case where a vehicle that had a value of $7,300 in 2021 went to $7,600 in 2022.  Even now, in ’23 that same vehicle has just dropped back to $7,500, so [the owner of] that particular vehicle will pay more taxes in 2023 than [they] paid in 2021.”

      Both lawmakers said this is exactly the kind of issue Missouri lawmakers should be addressing on behalf of their constituents.

      “It is common sense.  You have folks that are working, struggling to make ends meet, some of them on fixed incomes, they have to plan ahead, and then they get hit with a higher tax bill because of something that was beyond their control.  No, that’s not right and that’s something that the Missouri legislature should be fixing,” said Hudson.

      This year’s version of this legislation was passed out of the House 150-0 before stalling out in the Senate.  In 2022, Hudson carried a version of the bill that cleared the House 146-0 but also did not clear the Senate.

Prefiling for the 2024 Legislative Session Opens with More Than 300 Bills

Representative Willard Haley prefiles a piece of legislation for the 2024 legislative session. (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

As the Missouri General Assembly prepares for the 2024 legislative session, House members are revealing their legislative agendas for the upcoming year.  While the official commencement of the legislative session is in January, December 1st marks the true beginning for many legislators, who are allowed on that date to start filing bills for the forthcoming session. On this first day 343 bills were prefiled.

Bills that are prefiled are officially introduced on the first day of the session, January 3.  Members have the ability to introduce bills until March 1. 

Historically, the first day of prefiling witnesses a substantial influx of bills.  For the 2023 legislative session, House members submitted 336 bills on the inaugural day, contributing to a cumulative total of 578 bills during the entire pre-filing period.  Comparatively, for the 2022 session, legislators initiated the pre-filing process with 372 bills on the first day en route to total of 770 bills, deviating from the 688 bills filed for the 2021 legislative session and the record-breaking 776 bills for the 2020 session.

Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications

For the 2024 session, legislators will propose bills covering a diverse range of topics, aiming to enhance the state’s policies to better serve the needs of all residents.  Some say the pre-filing process sets the tone for session.  It’s when lawmakers can make their priorities known before the session begins.  While that is true, it doesn’t mean those bills have a better chance of making it into law.  As the statistics show, pre-filed bills are on virtually the same ground as those filed later on in the process.  There is no significant practical advantage to having a low bill number, but House members still strive to be the first to file their bills.  Bills are typically referred to legislative committees in numerical order, which potentially gives prefiled measures a better chance of being heard in committee.

Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications

One change that members will be subject to in the 2024 legislative session is a new provision added in the House rules during the 2023 legislative session.  This new provision, outlined in House Rule 39, restricts members from submitting more than 20 bills without obtaining prior approval from the Speaker of the House.  Officially implemented on July 1, 2023, this marks the first legislative session wherein members must adhere to the newly imposed cap on the number of bills they can file.

To stay informed about pre-filed bills in the House, please visit the official website of the Missouri House of Representatives at house.mo.gov and click on the “Pre-filed Bills” link.  The upcoming legislative session’s first day is scheduled for January 3, 2024.