Missouri House of Representatives Newsroom

Labor, tort, education, ethics, and regulatory reforms will be among the focuses of the Missouri House Republican supermajority in the 2017 legislative session.

“We want to have an aggressive approach early in session and really follow through on some of the things that we think the voters were talking about when they spoke in November,” said House Speaker Todd Richardson (R-Poplar Bluff).

Labor reform efforts will include work to pass legislation supporters call “right-to-work,” and “paycheck protection,” as well as reforms to project labor agreements.  Tort reforms will include resumption of efforts to pass legislation changing how expert witnesses are evaluated, and Missouri’s collateral source rule.

In education reform, Richardson says expansion of charter schools will be considered, and the caucus will look for ways to improve student achievement “across the board.”

“We’ve identified a task force of members in the House that’s going to start digging into those issues specifically,” said Richardson.

Richardson also wants to pick up where the legislature left off last year with ethics reform.  With that, his first goal in the House will be to again pass a bill banning gifts from lobbyists to legislators.

“I was proud of last year that we were able to take some substantive, meaningful steps forward on ethics reform but I don’t think anybody thinks that that job is complete,” said Richardson.  “We want the environment in Jefferson City to be better than it is today and that’s going to be an ongoing process.  This year that’s going to start with work on the gift ban.”

Republicans will also study Missouri’s regulations of businesses.

“We want to take this notion of cutting red tape and removing the regulatory barriers for business out of the campaign space and into the practical legislative space,” said Richardson.

He said the legislature will continue the work it began last year on a statewide regulatory framework for ride sharing companies like Uber and Lyft.  The House will also push legislation being called, “The Sunshine Act,” which would require an analysis of proposed regulations before they are enacted.

Richardson said the House will also take a more comprehensive look at what licensing requirements exist in Missouri, to see if it presents “unnecessary barriers” to employment.

He said such regulations affect a broad section of Missourians.  One example that has come up in legislation in recent years has been people who want to get paid to braid hair.

“You think about the notion of somebody having to go get literally hundreds of hours of training before the state will allow them to do a little hair braiding on the side because they want to earn some extra income,” said Richardson.  “It’s just something that doesn’t make sense when you explain it to most Missourians.”

The prefiling of bills for the 2017 legislative session began December 1.  The session begins January 4.

A state House Republican plans to propose tougher Missouri gun laws for those with a history of domestic violence.

Representative Donna Lichtenegger (R-Cape Girardeau) will propose mirroring Missouri law to a 1997 federal restriction on the ownership, possession, purchase, or sale of firearms by those convicted of domestic violence misdemeanors or who have orders of protection against them.  Missouri remains one of the states that have not adopted the same law, meaning only federal agents and courts can pursue cases regarding the federal law.

Missourians who were found guilty of a domestic violence misdemeanor or were the subject of an order of protection were to be denied concealed carry permits under the state’s original CCW law.  That prohibition was nullified after the legislature overturned the veto of SB 656, allowing anyone who can legally carry a gun to carry one concealed without getting a permit.

Lichtenegger expects her proposal will have support among her fellow Republicans’ supermajority.

“Under the circumstances of what I’m talking about and the fact that NRA is willing to help me … I’m not changing the gun bill at all,” said Lichtenegger.  “All I’m doing is taking the state law and matching it with the federal law as far as domestic violence goes just to give the people who are being hurt more coverage.”

Lichtenegger is pursuing the issue in part because of her own experience with domestic violence committed by her father when she was a child.

“My father was a violent alcoholic,” said Lichtenegger.  “Believe it or not, in his lawyer’s office he threatened to throw acid in my face and my brother’s face … when I was four years old I vividly remember my father abusing my mother.”

“I wanna make sure that these women and men who are hurt get their day in court without the fear that they’re going to be hurt more,” said Lichtenegger.

Lichtenegger said she is still developing language for a bill for the session that begins January 4, and said it could also deal in some way with those suffering from mental health issues.

A legislative task force on Human Trafficking has held its final hearing, though its members could continue its work in some form.

The group was created in 2015 with the goal of making recommendations to the legislature on how to fight trafficking in Missouri.  A report with those recommendations is due by the end of the year, and is being developed now.

The body already helped pass legislation adding to the crime of trafficking the advertising of a victim for sex or pornography, and letting a victim keep his or her address confidential, making it harder for traffickers to find them.

The group has been chaired by Springfield Republican Elijah Haahr.

“It’s been a good experience and I think it’s one of those things that everybody in the state can appreciate the work we’re doing here today,” said Haahr.  “Probably the biggest thing is opening people’s eyes to how bad the issue is in the Midwest, but then hopefully giving them some of the tools that we can to move forward.”

One of the task force’s recommendations will be the creation of a position in the state’s government that oversees anti-trafficking efforts.  That would require the legislature to propose where the money for such a person’s salary would come from in the state budget.  Discussion also continues of where in state government that position would be housed, or whether it should be a non-profit position outside of the government.

Other recommendations could include using state money to help support groups that offer victims treatment and assistance transitioning out of trafficking, and requiring that employers post the national trafficking hotline in break rooms.  Haahr expects six to ten recommendations will be included in the report.

Another possible recommendation that Haahr said could face some resistance is that of decriminalization in cases in which a person working as a prostitute was coerced.  He expects legislators to be more supportive of proposing tougher legal penalties for those who solicit prostitutes, and of options for trafficking victims to have prostitution convictions expunged from their records.

“Nobody wants to be perceived as Missouri going soft on crime,” said Haahr.  “You also don’t want traffickers to declare open season and think, ‘We can bring women to this state where they’re not going to get arrested for prostitution,’ and have an influx of new trafficking in the state.”

Several members of the task force expressed an interest in seeing it continue to meet, though it is set to expire at the end of this year.  The legislature could consider a resolution that would continue the group or create a new one, or it could continue to meet as a working group.  Members also learned that Attorney General-Elect Josh Hawley and the state courts are also discussing efforts to fight trafficking in Missouri, so lawmakers could wait to see what develops there before deciding how a legislative effort might proceed.

Haahr expects the task force’s report and included recommendations to be released in a matter of weeks.

Kansas City representative Gail McCann Beatty has been elected Minority Floor Leader for the 99^th General Assembly when it convenes in January.  She will lead a Democratic minority with 46 members in a chamber of 163 representatives.

Despite the challenges of being in a superminority and having an incoming governor from the opposing party, McCann Beatty said she looks forward to finding issues all sides can work together on.

“I’m going to reach out to the new governor and try to build a relationship with him and hopefully we can have a conversation about some of the things that are important to our caucus.  I do not believe that everything that we do, that we’ll be on opposite sides,” said McCann Beatty.  “I think there’s probably some things that we may be able to meet in the middle that are just good public policy for the state of Missouri.”

McCann Beatty said she already has a ‘decent’ relationship with House Speaker Todd Richardson (R-Poplar Bluff) and hopes to build on that, and find some things their respective caucuses can work on together.

“We still have a serious issue with infrastructure and that’s something that both sides understand that that’s a problem that we need to address, so the issue is how do we come together and come up with a good solution to resolve that.

“There are some education issues that we still need to address … I think there are still things we need to do to help get all of our districts where they need to be and early childhood education I think is one of those, so I think that’s something that I think both sides can agree that that’s something we need to do and we just need to figure out how do we do that,” said McCann Beatty.

McCann Beatty has been the ranking member of the House Budget Committee.  She said that committee and the budget process have been areas where in the last few years her party has had the ability to accomplish some of its goals despite being in the minority.  She expects that will continue.

McCann Beatty and her predecessor as minority leader, Representative Jake Hummel (D-St. Louis), have both said her party has remained relevant in the House despite being in the superminority.  She expects it will remain so.

“I think we simply have to continue to focus on our message and those things that we find important.  We’ve always stood for the working class, we’ve always stood for quality healthcare, we’ve always stood for quality education, we’ve always stood for a living wage, and those things won’t change.  We’ll continue to put our message out there,” said McCann Beatty.

McCann Beatty takes over for Hummel, who leaves the House due to term limits and will serve in the Missouri Senate beginning in 2017.

House Democrats elected the rest of their leadership team following Tuesday’s election.  The Assistant Minority Leader is Representative Gina Mitten (St. Louis), the Minority Whip is Kip Kendrick (Columbia), the Caucus Chair is Michael Butler (St. Louis), the Caucus Vice Chair is Randy Dunn (Kansas City), the Caucus Secretary is DaRon McGee (Kansas City), and the Policy Chair is Deb Lavender (Kirkwood).