Missouri House of Representatives Newsroom

With Senate prescription monitoring plan close to passage, House remains focused on its member’s version

The Missouri Senate appears prepared to endorse a prescription drug monitoring program. The House, however, remains focused on a plan proposed by one of its members who said the Senate bill won’t do the job.

Representative Holly Rehder has proposed for several years the creation of a prescription drug monitoring program in Missouri. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Backers of PDMPs say they help fight prescription drug abuse. They are intended to catch people in the act of “doctor shopping;” visiting multiple doctors in an attempt to get their hands on as much as they can of prescriptions commonly abused.

The Senate has given initial approval to a Senate Bill 74 sponsored by Senator Rob Schaaf (R-St. Joseph), meaning another vote could send it to the House for consideration. Schaaf has blocked advancement of earlier PDMP bills saying they would invade Missourians’ privacy by creating a database of their prescriptions.

His plan would let doctors submit a patient’s name to the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs. It would then give that doctor access to the patient’s medical records only if the Bureau determined the patient is a potential abuser.

Sikeston Representative Holly Rehder (R) has sponsored PDMP legislation in the House for several years. She said neither her nor Schaaf are willing to budge on their approaches to a plan.

“He would allow physicians to see what their patient is doing if a red light comes back. Well, you know, that’s after a problem has already been discovered and we’re already down that road,” said Rehder. “Physicians need to be able to have full understanding of what their patients are on and what they’re doing so that they can make those best clinical decisions. I’m not able to give on that point because to me that’s the most important part to help this epidemic that we are in. That’s the way to decrease overdoses. That’s the cornerstone of this legislation.”

Missouri is the only state without a PDMP. Other states allow doctors to access their patients’ prescription information through a secured database. Rehder said such a database gives doctors quick access to information they are already authorized to view.

“They just have to call around and get it from kind of doing the phone tree – calling the pharmacies and other doctors,” said Rehder. “This just allows a one spot place that the physicians can go, that pharmacists can go to make sure that they’re not prescribing something that’s harmful, that’s going to counteract with other medications … this a huge opportunity for physicians to be able to spot the signs of addiction early and to help get that person on a manageable path back to a healthy lifestyle.”

As for Schaaf’s concerns about privacy, Rehder said the prescription drug database would be encrypted.

“If somebody were to get this information they wouldn’t be able to read it,” said Rehder. “[Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act] laws – our federal laws – really cover this area very well, which is why we have electronic medical records, and this is just another portion of that.”

Rehder says Schaaf’s bill is also so expensive it might never be implemented. Legislative researchers estimate that if passed, SB 74 would cost more than $1-million dollars in Fiscal Year ’18 – similar to the projected year one cost of Rehder’s legislation – but in Fiscal Years ’19 and ’20, Schaaf’s bill’s projected cost each year is greater than $6.5-million.

Rehder believes the actual cost of her bill would be less than $1-million dollars, and said with grants and other funding sources it would pose less of a challenge to fund.

Rehder took up the PDMP issue in response to her own family’s issues with prescription drug abuse. Her daughter, Raychel, became addicted to an opioid pain reliever after an emergency room visit when she was 17. She went on to abuse other substances including methamphetamine, but has been clean for going on two years. Other members of Rehder’s family have also struggled with abuse issues.

Rehder’s PDMP legislation in past sessions has passed out of the House with overwhelming support only to be stalled in the Senate, where opposition was largely led by Schaaf. House Speaker Todd Richardson (R-Poplar Bluff) said even with Schaaf’s bill close to coming to his chamber, the focus of the House is going to remain on Rehder’s efforts.

“Representative Rehder has been the thought leader on prescription drug monitoring here in the House for some time and for good reason,” said Richardson. “We’ll continue to allow Representative Rehder to stay in the driver’s seat on that bill and we’ll see if we can work through the differences with the Senate.”

Rehder’s legislation, House Bill 90, is nearly ready for debate by the full House.

House budget chairman on search for savings in FY ’18 budget; wariness about tobacco settlement money

The House took another step in drafting a budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1, when the bills that make up that spending plan were filed.

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Meanwhile, House appropriations committees continue taking testimony from state agencies and elected officials about how much they want or hope to receive in state money if Fiscal Year ’18.

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob) said those committees are looking for places the state can save money to offset a $500-million shortfall.

He said lawmakers are looking at renegotiating managed care contracts to reschedule some expenses as the state switches to managed care in FY 18, and examining the funding request from the state employee retirement system to make sure it isn’t unnecessarily great.

Governor Eric Greitens (R) last week recommended changes to his own budget proposal that would see greater spending on public school transportation and on in-home services for low-income residents with disabilities.

Fitzpatrick said the problem is Greitens proposes funding those restorations with money from Missouri’s settlement with tobacco companies. Greitens based his latest proposal on a Missouri Supreme Court ruling that would let Missouri get $52-million in settlement money.

“I think we will see that money but I think there’s a potential for another negative decision on the tobacco lawsuit front for the next year that is basically a new lawsuit that could offset any gains we’re making from that,” said Fitzpatrick. “I’m not 100-percent convinced that we’re going to spend the extra money that the governor recommended. I think if we can get comfortable with the likelihood that we’re actually going to have it available in the fiscal year that we may go ahead and spend that, but we’ll look at the best way to spend it.”

The appropriations committees will begin this week preparing their recommendations for spending in the areas they respectively deal with. In two weeks the main budget committee will prepare its spending proposal with Fitzpatrick’s input, creating a spending plan that will be debated by the full House.

Recent news articles have questioned whether the legislature, in this tight budget year, will fund Missouri’s new voter photo ID law, approved by voters in November. Fitzpatrick said it would be supported.

“We’re not going to play games with that,” said Fitzpatrick. “We’ve talked with Secretary of State [John] Ashcroft multiple times about it, and we’re going to make sure that he has what he feels is necessary, whether it be from general revenue or a federal fund that the Secretary of State has access to, we’re going to make sure that he has ample authority to implement that law the way that the statute requires.”

The bills Fitzpatrick filed last week don’t represent his budget recommendation, but that of Governor Greitens. He said he took that action with a mind for history.

“It is basically the only historical record of a governor’s budget. If you go back and try to find governor’s budgets from previous years, if the budget chairman does not file the governor’s recommendation then that is not documented … there is no permanent record of that,” said Fitzpatrick. “The bills themselves are the exact everything that the governor sent. There are even typos in there that staff found and I said, ‘Nope, leave them the same.’”

Panel on Corrections Department environment hears of ‘vague’ harassment policies, working in ‘hell’

A week after being frustrated by two Department of Corrections officials’ responses to questions about harassment, members of a Missouri House subcommittee heard from two Department employees who described an environment of nepotism, harassment, and retaliation in the state’s prison system.

Members of the House Subcommittee on Corrections Workforce Environment and Conduct listen to testimony (file). (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Travis Case, who is three years away from retiring from the Department, told lawmakers, “You come in every day and the negativity, it’s like you’re walking into hell.”

Case works in the Northeast Correctional Center in Bowling Green, in its canteen – a store where inmates can purchase items including snacks, drinks, and tobacco products.

He told legislators that prison has seen a high rate of turnover with many veteran staff members leaving – an issue he believes likely exists department-wide. He said morale is low and complained that he believed prison wardens have too much power.

“This came out of a deputy warden’s mouth and I agree with him wholeheartedly,” said Case. “’We give these wardens the keys to the kingdom and we let them run it however they see fit, and that’s a big problem.’”

Case was talking to a panel formed to look into the environment in the Corrections system after reports came to light of employee-on-employee harassment and retaliation against those who reported problems. Some cases resulted in lawsuits, some of which the state has settled resulting in millions of dollars in payouts. Other cases are still pending.

Case said the Department’s policies, including its policy regarding harassment, are too vague.

“Missouri supposedly has a zero tolerance policy for sexual harassment and discrimination, but the policies don’t reflect that. The policies are so vague that if you want to fire somebody for sexual harassment or discrimination or retaliation – whatever the case may be – you can do it if you want to, but if you don’t want to you also don’t have to,” said Case. “That’s where the favoritism comes in.”

The subcommittee also heard from Lieutenant Jason Horn, a corrections officer at the Farmington Correctional Center. Horn read off a litany of suggestions for improvements in the Department, including its handling of harassment.

“Send all claims of … discrimination, harassment, retaliation, to Human Resources. There should not be a choice. No passing the buck,” Horn recommended. “If we can have somebody with a nonbiased opinion come in and look at these problems and these issues in a way that they need to be looked at with no choice – with no choice of the warden or anyone else, then I think things would get dealt with a little more appropriately than they do.”

Subcommittee members expressed gratitude at the two men for coming to testify. After its previous hearing one panel member said it seemed as though department officials were, “passing the buck,” shuffling harassment claims back and forth between departments. Members expressed frustration at the answers they received from the Department’s Inspector General and its Division of Human Resources Director.

Chairman Jim Hansen (R-Frankford) said he wants to hear from more Department employees before the committee prepares its recommendations for changes in Corrections.

Other related stories:

Bill seeks better oversight of state settlements, after harassment in Corrections Department

Subcommittee on harassment in Corrections Department frustrated by Department’s structure, process

New prison system director talks to House committee about harassment, more

MO House subcommittee will investigate harassment in Corrections Department

Missouri House proposes bigger fines for illegally applying herbicides, after Bootheel farmers’ losses

The state House has proposed tougher penalties for farmers who intentionally misapply herbicides. Such applications have cost some farmers crops and the money invested in them, as highlighted by incidents in Southeast Missouri last year.

Representative Don Rone said fines had to be great enough to hurt some farmers' bottom line before they would stop illegal application of herbicides. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications) — Representative Don Rone said fines had to be great enough to hurt some farmers’ bottom line before they would stop illegal application of herbicides. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

The University of Missouri said 150 or more farmers lost an average of 35-percent of their crops when neighboring operations illegally used an outdated dicamba product. When that product spread onto nearby fields planted with seeds not resistant to dicamba, they were damaged.

Farmers can now be fined $1,000 for applying herbicide to a crop for which it is not labeled. House Bill 662 would let the Department of Agriculture fine a farmer up to $1,000 for every acre herbicide is applied to, off-label. The fine could be doubled for repeat violators.

The bill is sponsored by Portageville Republican Don Rone, who said the current, flat $1,000 fine is not enough to discourage some farmers from using products they think will better serve them.

“What this does is just basically give the state the ability go after the people that misuse herbicides in the state,” said Rone.

The money collected in fines would go to the school district local to the affected fields. Rone explained the state’s statutes prevent it from giving that money to farmers who suffered damage.

“The state cannot make farmers whole. They can issue fines but they can’t make the farmer whole,” said Rone. “That takes the action of a court, or in the old days when I first started farming, if I hurt you, I’d come to you and say, ‘Gentleman how much do you think that I hurt you?’ and I’d write you a check.”

The House voted to add an emergency clause to the bill, which would make it effective immediately upon being signed into law by the governor. Rone hopes the bill can clear the Senate and be signed into law by mid-March so that it will be in effect for the new planting season.

Earlier stories:

House Asked to consider tougher penalties for illegal herbicide use that cost farmers crops

Lawmaker plans to propose tougher penalties for illegal use of herbicides after Bootheel farmers’ losses

House committee hearing to focus on farmers’ losses due to illegal use of herbicide

Missouri House again endorses less time for unemployment benefits

The Missouri House has again voted to reduce the length of time people can claim unemployment benefits.

House Budget Committee Chairman Scott Fitzpatrick again carried unemployment fund reform legislation as he did in 2015. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

House Bill 288, sent to the Senate Thursday, would cut that time period from 20 to 13 weeks if the state’s unemployment rate is less than 6-percent. It could increase if the jobless rate increases, reaching a maximum of 20 weeks if that rate exceeds 9-percent.

Republicans said the measure is meant to keep the state’s unemployment fund solvent when the economy takes a downturn. Missouri has had to borrow money from the federal government to cover benefits in past economic slowdowns, and business owners have had to pay millions of dollars in interest on those loans.

“Missouri’s the only state that’s had to borrow in the last five recessions, so we’re trying to fix that,” said bill sponsor Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Shell Knob).

Democrats including Gladstone representative Jon Carpenter called the bill unnecessary. He pointed to other states with Republican leadership that offer 26-weeks of benefits and pay more each month.

“Don’t vote yes on this bill because we’ve got to keep the fund solvent. Don’t let that be the argument unless somebody proves to you why that is – why that’s necessary when all these other states can do it,” said Carpenter.

Fitzpatrick said many of those states likely make getting benefits more difficult than does Missouri, allowing them to do more with fewer funds.

Representative Jon Carpenter urged his colleagues to vote against changes to Missouri unemployment benefits. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Representative Rick Brattin (R-Harrisonville) and other Republicans said 20 weeks is plenty of time for a person to find another job.

“Everyone here can do their due diligence and walk, and go through your districts and you will find ‘help wanted’ signs everywhere,” said Brattin. “We don’t have a ‘jobs’ problem. We have a ‘people willing to work problem’ within our districts.”

Representative Bruce Franks, Junior, (D-St. Louis City) said that isn’t true in his district, and said it can often take more than three months for a person to learn the skills or earn the certification needed to take on a new job.

“When we’re talking about bills – especially unemployment compensation, that affects every single Missourian – only thing I ask is the thing that I’ll continue to ask every time I stand up here and talk about any bill, is that we take all communities into consideration,” said Franks.

The measure mirrors one the legislature endorsed over the veto of former Governor Jay Nixon in 2015 that the state Supreme Court threw out on a procedural issue.

Bill seeks better oversight of state settlements, after harassment in Corrections Department

House lawmakers shocked by what some have called an environment of harassment and retaliation in the Department of Corrections are considering a bill they hope will let the legislature know when such situations are present.

Minority Leader Gail McCann Beatty presents House Bill 858 to the House Budget Committee. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

An article on Pitch.com detailed numerous reports of employee-on-employee harassment in Corrections, including cases of retaliation against those who reported it. Some cases resulted in lawsuits that have cost the state millions in settlements and more cases are pending.

House Minority Leader Gail McCann Beatty (D-Kansas City) has filed a House Bill 858, which would require the Attorney General to report to the General Assembly every month on activity concerning the state’s Legal Expense Fund. That’s the fund from which the state pays all defense costs, including all settlements.

McCann Beatty and others say such reports would inform the legislature when there are problems in state agencies such as those coming to light in Corrections.

“We can’t possibly address the issue if we don’t know what’s happening,” McCann Beatty told the House Budget Committee, of which she was formerly a member.

As House Communications reported in December, lawmakers say they didn’t know about the repeated incidents of harassment in part because the Legal Expense Fund has for years had an open-ended dollar amount in it. The line included an “E,” for “estimate,” which meant if expenses in that line exceeded what the legislature budgeted, more money could be spent on it.

That meant even though multiple lawsuits stemming from harassment cases in Corrections were being litigated and settled, the Department never had to come before the legislature and explain or justify the additional expense.

Budget makers plan to remove that “E” so that similar situations will have to be explained to the legislature in the future, but McCann Beatty’s proposal would require further accounting.

“It allows us to monitor what is going out of that fund so that we can see patterns, and see if there’s a problem,” said McCann Beatty.

Lawmakers say such oversight could reveal similar recurring problems in other state agencies. McCann Beatty gave the Budget Committee information from the Attorney General’s Office showing the state had spent about $60-million on settlements in the past five years, though the legislature had only appropriated about $30-million for legal expenses.

In the fiscal year that began July 1, the Attorney General’s Office reports Missouri has expended more than $17-million in 24 settlements and 4 judgments. Those settlements include 16 discrimination or retaliation claims among seven state agencies.

“I think if you look at that list you will see that these lawsuits – it is not simply the Department of Corrections, but in fact it is a statewide issue,” said McCann Beatty. “As a legislature I think all of us want to see that climate changed.”

The budget committee is expected to vote on McCann Beatty’s bill tomorrow.

Proposed ‘Good Samaritan Law’ aims to save the lives of some who would overdose

A state House member wants to encourage people to call for help for friends and loved ones having an overdose.

Representative Steve Lynch presents his proposed “Good Samaritan” law, which he believes would save lives of some who would suffer from an overdose. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Waynesville Republican Steve Lynch says his legislation, House Bill 294, is commonly known as a “good Samaritan” law. It would protect a person from arrest or prosecution for charges related to minor possession of drugs or paraphernalia, or being under the influence, if that person calls for emergency medical help for a person suffering a drug or alcohol overdose.

“Good Samaritan laws like this one address the fear of criminal repercussions for assisting and seeking medical emergency services while they may have a small amount of drugs on them or may be under the influence of drugs or alcohol,” said Lynch.

Lynch alternately refers to the bill as “Bailey and Cody’s Law,” for two overdose victims, each of whom had a parent testify in favor of HB 294 in a House Committee on Crime Prevention and Public Safety hearing.

Jim Marshall thinks such a law would have prevented friends of his son, Cody, from leaving where he was found by his father: on the living room floor dying of an overdose.

“I really believe those young men feared the perception of what we’re talking about – of being prosecuted, being blamed for the overdose situation,” said Marshall. “I think that’s the big part of this whole scenario here. Even if the police are saying they have discretion to prosecute, there’s that fear.”

Lisa Benton said friends of her daughter, Bailey, watched as she had two seizures and waited for a drug dealer to leave before calling 911.

“I don’t see how anybody could watch anybody suffer like that, and I know that my daughter made a terrible choice to do drugs, but she didn’t deserve to lose her life. She should be here right now,” said Benton. “I strongly believe that if this law was in effect that it would have saved her.”

Representative Justin Hill (R-Lake St. Louis) asked whether the bill goes far enough to truly make a difference.

“If somebody knows they can still be charged with manslaughter or distribution, does this fix the problem?” asked Hill.

Supporters told Hill the bill would be part of a series of steps toward addressing the problem. Lynch said another of those steps was taken last year, when the legislature passed and former Governor Jay Nixon signed a bill to make a heroin overdose antidote more readily available.

MO House again asked to require independent investigators in officer-involved deaths

A House Republican is again proposing that independent investigators be required whenever a law enforcement officer in Missouri is involved in someone’s death.

Representative Shamed Dogan (right) listens as Michael Bell testifies in favor of a bill that would require independent investigations of all deaths involving law enforcement officers. Bell's son was fatally shot by police in Kenosha, WI, in 2004. Bell later won a lawsuit against police in that case. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications) — Representative Shamed Dogan (right) listens as Michael Bell testifies in favor of a bill that would require independent investigations of all deaths involving law enforcement officers. Bell’s son was fatally shot by police in Kenosha, WI, in 2004. Bell later won a lawsuit against police in that case. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

House Bill 232 would require all law enforcement agencies in Missouri to have written policies on how officer-involved deaths would be handled. Those policies would have to utilize at least two investigators, with neither of them being employed by the same agency as the officer involved in the death. In the case of traffic-related deaths, the bill would require that an outside crash reconstruction team participate in the investigation.

The bill would also require the investigators issue a report to the local prosecutor. If that prosecutor decides no prosecution will follow, the investigators would make that report public.

This is the third year Representative Shamed Dogan (R-Baldwin) has offered such a bill.

“My personal interest in it came after the events in Ferguson. I was really just seeking ways to try and improve people’s trust in police,” said Dogan. “As we saw in Ferguson and other incidents in our state since then, I think there has been a diminished trust that whenever police do kill someone in their custody that there’s going to be justice done for that person.”

The bill is modeled after legislation that has become law in Wisconsin. It was backed by Michael Bell, whose son Michael was shot and killed by police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 2004. Bell later won a lawsuit against police over the incident.

Bell said the legislation has been put to the test in the four states where it has been passed and he believes it has worked well and has improved the public’s trust in law enforcement. He said that would also make police safer.

“One of the things I was appalled by was the shooting of the five police officers in Dallas,” said Bell. “Those retribution-type things are occurring out there, and I think that this would help in the right direction of making those retribution-type shootings become nonexistent.”

Representative Justin Hill (R-Lake St. Louis), a former O’Fallon police officer and drug task force member, questioned whether the bill would make a difference.

“There’s no direction [in the bill] as to how far and wide you seek other law enforcement investigators,” said Hill. “In St. Louis County, I mean we have like 30 agencies within, I don’t know, 20 square miles probably. Don’t you fear that you get the same thing there? I mean, ‘Hey buddy, come on over here and investigate this?”

As in past years, some have questioned what the cost of Dogan’s proposal would be on law enforcement agencies, especially in rural areas.

Hill also said many law enforcement agencies in Missouri already use an outside investigator in officer-involved deaths.

“There was an independent investigation in Ferguson and the city still burned,” said Hill.

Dogan said after the House last week endorsed legislation that would increase penalties when certain crimes are committed against law enforcement, following up with his legislation makes sense.

“We had a very productive and very heartfelt debate over bills concerning how we can protect law enforcement officers, and we definitely stood up as a body and said, ‘We have your backs,’ to law enforcement, all the people in our communities ask is that we have their backs,” said Dogan.

The bill would allow the agency an officer involved in a death works for to conduct its own investigation as long as it would not interfere with the independent investigation that the bill requires.

Bill named for Hailey Owens aims to accelerate and improve Amber Alerts

Changes meant to get Amber Alerts out more quickly and ensure they are as effective as they can be would become law under a bill in the House.

Representative Curtis Trent (right) listens as Jim Wood testifies in favor of HB 697, Hailey's Law. Wood said it is his son, Craig, who abducted and murdered 10-year-old Hailey Owens, for whom the legislation is named. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications) — Representative Curtis Trent (right) listens as Jim Wood testifies in favor of HB 697, Hailey’s Law. Wood said it is his son, Craig, who abducted and murdered 10-year-old Hailey Owens, for whom the legislation is named. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

House Bill 697 would establish Hailey’s Law, named for 10-year-old Hailey Owens of Springfield, who was kidnapped and murdered in February, 2014.

About two-and-a-half hours passed after Owens’ abduction before an Amber Alert was issued in the case. Though it is now known that an earlier alert would not have saved her, the case prompted lawmakers and others to press for changes to make sure alerts would be issued faster.

The legislation known as “Hailey’s Law” has been offered before in the House but did not become law. Even so, the Highway Patrol has launched implementation of some of the system changes it would require, so that alerts would go out earlier and with fewer steps needed to issue them.

This year the bill is being carried by Representative Curtis Trent (R-Springfield), who said it’s still important to make sure those changes are required by law.

“I think everyone’s on the same page here, but we’re just trying to make sure that it’s in statute, it’s going to happen in a timely basis, and if systems change in the future that the continued integration will always be a part of that,” Trent said.

Jim Wood, the father of the man charged with abducting and killing Hailey Owens, urged members of the House Committee on Crime Prevention and Public Safety to advance HB 697.

“I reached out to [Hailey’s family] with a deep sense of grief for my own family, and a deep sense of compassion for Hailey Owens and her family,” said Wood. “It was two-and-a-half hours later before the Amber Alert was released,” Wood recalled of the events the day his son, he said, took Owens. “We all know if we look at child abductions that children are usually dead within 45-minutes. We need to fix this problem, and Hailey’s Law will enhance the Amber Alert system that will protect these children.”

HB 697 would also require that the Amber Alert System Oversight Committee meet annually to discuss potential improvements to the Amber Alert System.

Subcommittee on harassment in Corrections Department frustrated by Department’s structure, process

A House subcommittee appointed to investigate harassment and retaliation in the Department of Corrections thinks how the Department handles allegations is not clear, at best.

Representatives Paul Fitzwater (left) and Bruce Franks listen to testimony during a hearing by the Subcommittee on Corrections Workforce Environment and Conduct. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

The Subcommittee on Corrections Workforce Environment and Conduct was formed in response to an article on Pitch.com that detailed incidents within the department that in some cases led to lawsuits, costing the state millions of dollars.

The subcommittee took testimony from the department’s Inspector General, Amy Roderick, and the Division of Human Services Director, Cari Collins. Representatives asked questions about who handles harassment allegations and who makes decisions about any disciplinary actions that might be the result of those allegations. They weren’t satisfied with what they heard, with members calling the Department’s administrative structure “confusing.”

“It appears to be a shell game to me in terms of where it goes, where it doesn’t go, who has a say in when it goes,” said subcommittee chairman Jim Hansen (R-Frankford).

Collins told the committee staff in her division deals with reports of harassment, and she was not aware of any complaints about how harassment had been handled.

“I don’t know of any examples where it wasn’t taken care of,” said Collins. “Whenever anything is reported to us, we investigate it. What is done with that investigation is not determined by human resources.”

She said decisions about discipline of most prison employees, including terminations, falls on the Director of the Division of Adult Institutions, Dave Dormire, who answers to the Department Director.

Collins told the committee changes have been made in the past five years in her division’s procedures and its number of staff members that conduct investigations. She said some changes also followed meetings involving legal counsel, about the number of harassment complaints and resulting settlements.

“We increased the number of ways that an employee can report allegations, the number of people they can report it to, we also expanded the definition of what needed to be reported,” said Collins. “We added unprofessional conduct because for a supervisor or even a CAO, we don’t want them trying to figure if something might be discrimination, harassment, or retaliation. If it’s unprofessional we want them to send it up. HR will look at it and make that determination … that’s one of the reasons the number of reports have increased, because we’ve expanded the definition of what needs to come to us.”

Representative Jim Hansen chairs the House Subcommittee on Corrections Workforce Environment and Conduct. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Roderick told the committee her office does not handle harassment, but would investigate anything with a criminal component to it such as assaults. The committee asked her if she was familiar with an incident described in the Pitch.com article in which an employee who had complained about harassment was allegedly poisoned when she returned to work. Roderick said she had read the article, but had no knowledge of the incident.

Roderick said it would have been up to the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), more commonly called the warden, of an institution whether to notify her office of such an incident.

“So she could be poisoned on the grounds of the institution and there’s a warden out there that didn’t think that needed to go up the chain,” said Representative John McCaherty.

“It could happen,” Roderick told the committee.

The Department’s structure frustrated many of the lawmakers on the committee.

“We have an investigative body that’s technically not allowed to investigate everything,” said Representative Bruce Franks (D-St. Louis City), referring to the poisoning case not being referred for investigation by the warden at the institution where it took place. “I don’t like to speculate but I’m pretty sure this isn’t the only case. And so the checks and balances, they aren’t there.”

Franks expressed frustration at what the two Department officials explained about how allegations are handled, and passed among different parts of the Department’s organization.

“We bring two directors here, or two professionals here … but it really seems like it’s just passing the buck, or saying, ‘Oh well, we don’t do this. This person does this,’ and I just want to get the person in here who we need to be talking to,” said Franks. “It seems like we just need to cut a bunch of positions and provide more compensation for our correctional officers.”

“The objective of this board is to get to the bottom of it and help,” Franks added. “At the end of the day we just want it to be better, especially for our employees.”

Hansen said one of the subcommittee’s goals is to learn about how the Department is structured. After that hearing he expects one of the subcommittee’s recommendations will be that Corrections’ process of handling all types of complaints be streamlined.

The subcommittee is expected to hold its next hearing Thursday morning.