House Speaker Tim Jones Says Missouri House Will Act Quickly to Preserve Second Amendment Rights and Privacy of Missourians

House Speaker Tim Jones said today that the Missouri House of Representatives will act quickly to address concerns that the Missouri Department of Revenue is violating the privacy and Second Amendment rights of Missourians.

He plans to fast track legislation sponsored by state Rep. Rick Brattin, R-Harrisonville, that would eliminate concealed carry endorsements and replace them with concealed carry permits. Specifically, it would allow the sheriff in each county to issue permits to Missourians with a certificate of qualification for a concealed carry endorsement or a driver's or non-driver's license with a concealed carry endorsement. Jones said the change would ensure Missourians are able to receive their concealed carry permits without fear their information is being shared with out-of-state parties.

“The ongoing legal challenge against the department’s current practices has caused many Missourians to have concerns that their private information is being shared without their consent. We must act quickly to restore the public’s trust and to safeguard their ability to obtain a concealed carry permit without having their right to privacy violated,” said Jones, R-Eureka, who also said he plans to refer Brattin’s legislation to committee when the legislature returns from its annual Spring Break on Monday, Mar. 25.

Jones and the members of the Missouri General Assembly made the issue a priority following a lawsuit filed by a Stoddard County man who objected to new requirements put in place by the revenue department. Eric Griffin was informed by his local fee office that the new requirements necessitated that his personal information be scanned in order to add his concealed carry endorsement to his license. Griffin refused saying he should not be forced to have documents scanned that could jeopardize the privacy of his personal information. At present, Stoddard County Judge Robert Mayer has issued a 10-day restraining order preventing the fee office from issuing concealed carry endorsements.

Jones said his goal is to find a legislative solution that will prevent any interruption in services that would prevent Missourians from obtaining or renewing an endorsement, while also making certain the personal information of all residents is protected and private. He said he will continue to work with his colleagues to explore all options for a legislative fix for an issue he said is a top priority for the second half of the legislative session.

Brattin’s legislation is HB 859.

Higher education officials voice support for $950 million bond proposal

By Matthew Patane
(MDN News) -- Higher education officials from across the state came before a House panel Tuesday, Feb. 5, to voice their support for an almost billion dollar bond proposal and to ask for state funds for a growing list of campus building and renovation projects.

University of Missouri System President Tim Wolfe said the four-campus system has a $1.3 billion backlog of projects, such as renovating the engineering buildings at the system's Columbia campus. Representatives from other state colleges and universities echoed Wolfe's remarks with their own lists of projects that have been put on hold due to a lack of state funds.

Last month, House Speaker Tim Jones, R-Eureka, announced the creation of a special committee that was established for the express purpose of dealing with the $950 million bond proposal. In addition to construction on college campuses, the bond would dedicate funds for state buildings and facilities and potentially transportation infrastructure.

Committee chairman Rep. Chris Kelly, D-Columbia, said he would prefer if the bond proposal was combined with a transportation funding measure that was introduced earlier on Tuesday. If approved by voters, that legislation would dedicate funding specifically for Missouri's roads and transportation infrastructure through a one-cent increase of the state sales tax for 10 years.

No one spoke in opposition to the bond proposal at Tuesday's hearing, but Kelly acknowledged that the atmosphere may not remain friendly as the committee continues to work on the measure.

"Every single one of us will be disappointed, but every single one of us will be delighted," Kelly said. "There's no way that we can do everything that we need to do, but we can do some very good things and move our economy forward."

Rep. Jason Smith files HJR 7 to Protect Missourians’ Right to Hunt, Fish and Farm

Rep. Jason Smith pre-filed a constitutional amendment today to protect the right of Missourians to hunt, fish and farm. This amendment comes in the wake of a recent regulatory movement, spear-headed by career bureaucrats and Washington DC special interests, to force state agencies to implement regulations reducing the ability of citizens to hunt, fish and farm.

“While Missouri state agencies can create rules to restrict our ability to hunt, fish and farm, these rules have to comply with our constitution,” said Smith, R-Salem. “One way to ensure out-of-state special interests don’t pass rules restricting the number of cows that a rancher can own, or pass rules making it illegal to hunt deer, is to protect the right to hunt, fish and farm in our state’s constitution.”

Smith’s proposal is very similar to a constitutional amendment that recently passed in North Dakota. There, outside special interest groups representing vegan and animal rights activists poured millions of dollars into a ballot measure designed to alter that state’s animal laws. Smith’s amendment is seen as a firewall, protecting Missouri from these outside groups.

“This amendment will preserve Missourians’ choices at the supermarket and enshrine our long-held traditions of agriculture, hunting and fishing.  Consumers and producers alike deserve the right to raise and consume the food of their choice without interference from big-money special interests and out-of-touch bureaucrats.”

The constitutional amendment has been co-sponsored by more than 30 of Smith’s colleagues including House Speaker Tim Jones.

Gov. Nixon voices support for Medicaid expansion

By Matt Evans, Eric Stoyanov and Nick Thompson

(MDN News) -- Gov. Jay Nixon announced his support for expansion of the state's Medicaid program under the new federal health care law.

But his proposal for one of the state's largest Medicaid expansions in history came under immediate attack from top Republican leaders.

At a series of news conferences across the state, Nixon pointed to the federal law that would provide full federal funding for the health care coverage of up to 300,000 recipients for the first three years.

After that, however, the state would have to begin picking up a part of the expense at a cost to the state's budget estimated to exceed $100 million per year.

Republican critics, including the House Speaker and lieutenant governor, argued the state could not afford that cost. Nixon, however cited a University of Missouri study that predicts more than 24,000 jobs can be created in 2014 if the state takes part in the expansion.

While Republicans criticized Nixon's welfare expansion proposal, a slight opening emerged for agreement.

The Republican-leaning Missouri Chamber of Commerce endorsed the expansion, and the Senate's Appropriations Committee chair said he wanted to wait on a decision until he got more information from the administration.

"We support the expansion," chamber spokeswomen Karen Buschmann said. "While we do not support the Affordable Care Act, we are supporting this expansion as part of it. It is the law of the land. We do not feel that we should leave the federal money on the table."  

Under the Affordable Care Act, states must expand the Medicaid program to cover people with incomes below 138 percent of the federal poverty line. In upholding the federal law, The U.S. Supreme Court gave states the option to expand the program or not.

Under the expansion proposal, the federal government would foot the bill of expanding the program for the first three years. In 2017, the state would pay 5 percent of the costs and by 2020 the state would pay up to 10 percent.

"Congress passed it, the President signed it, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld it. It is the law of the land," Nixon said during his series of news conferences in St. Louis, Kansas City and Springfield.

Nixon's Republican critics charged the governor was expanding the state's largest welfare program, which already costs Missouri $8 billion a year.

"Overwhelming majorities of the legislature are opposed to this and will not go along with a gigantic expansion of welfare," Republican Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder said. "I think those that do support it in the legislature are overwhelmingly outnumbered and that it will not come to a vote in either the House or the Senate."

House Speaker Tim Jones, R-St. Louis County, could not be reached for comment but said in a statement that he is concerned where the funding will come from for the Medicaid expansion.

"Now is not the time to put our state on the end of yet another big-government program that will only increase the burden on future taxpayers," Jones said.

A study commissioned by the Missouri Hospital Association and the Missouri Foundation for Health predicts as many as 220,000 Missourians would be eligible for the expanded program. Other studies, however, project as many as 300,000 people would be eligible in the state.

According to the University of Missouri study, the federal government would pay about $8.2 billion through 2019 while the state would spend about $332.9 million and about $100 million per year after 2019 to cover new enrollees. A report released earlier this week by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Urban Institute projected the federal government's cost at $17.8 billion and with the state's share at $1.6 billion from 2013 to 2022.

Missouri hospitals are also advocating for the expansion, citing losses in federal payments that reimburse hospitals serving large numbers of low-income patients.

A provision of the federal health care law cuts Disproportionate Share Hospital Adjustment Payments (DSH) in half by 2020. Those federal payments go to hospitals that treat large numbers of low-income patients without health coverage. Missouri received the seventh highest DSH funding in the country in 2011.

Dave Dillon, a spokesman for the Missouri Hospital Association, said Missouri hospitals provide $1 billion worth of uncompensated care in any given year.

Dillon said without the expansion, some Missouri hospitals may suffer when the reimbursement payments are cut. The expansion would allow those low-income patients without insurance to enroll in Medicaid, making DSH payments obsolete.

"If they disappear or are substantially reduced and we don't see an increase in Medicaid, or folks enrolling in an exchange, the hospital and health care infrastructure in the state will be significantly hurt by this," Dillon said.   

A Moment with Mike -- Dealing with Obamacare

With the 97^th General Assembly ready to convene in just a little over a month, the topics and issues that will be at the forefront are starting to emerge.   The new Speaker of the House, Tim Jones has indicated that his priorities are economic and job development, energy policy and education reform.  These are topics that are consistently debated and will continue to be relevant.  However, other important issues that could seriously affect our precarious budget situation and the future of our state may rise to the top.

      The Affordable Care Act which we all refer to as Obamacare was upheld by the Supreme Court of our land.  This act will have extreme consequences on some individuals, businesses and, of course, state and federal budgets.  We have already discussed the implications of creating a Health Care Exchange which will soon be required of all states.  Our Governor has already indicated that the state would not create an exchange and the people recently voted to only create one with the approval of the legislature or the people.  This means that the federal government will probably be creating some type of exchange in Missouri and the cost which will come from our taxes is only a guess at this time.

      The Supreme Court ruling did give each state the option to accept federal funds to expand Medicaid to those that earn up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level.  The Governor has come out in favor of this expansion and hospitals and primary care associations are leading the charge for this expansion.  Advocates say that this will not only provide health care for an estimated 300,000 people, but it will create jobs and increase the state and local tax revenues to help cover the costs.  The federal government will cover the costs for the first three years and then the state will gradually start paying a small percent and work its way up to ten percent after eight years.   Health care providers have already seen reduced payment for Medicaid patients and are looking to this expansion to help make up these losses when expansion would kick in.  They say that if the state does not enact this expansion that there will be providers that will no longer see Medicaid patients or possibly go out of business.

      There is another side of this, however, that we must consider before jumping into another federal government backed  assistance program, many of which are major contributors to an insurmountable national debt and have encumbered state budgets for years.   Health and welfare programs are already the biggest budget items for the state and far outpace the spending that we provide to educate our kids.  The huge amount of federal money, of course, is paid by your taxes and the amount that the state will eventually pick up is estimated to be well over $300 million, an amount that will expand every year.  This past budget year, with no change in eligibility, Medicaid costs went up $189 million.  How we come up with this kind of money when our state workers are the lowest paid in the nation, our education funding is hundreds of millions of dollars behind, the department of transportation is desperate for funds and we are very slowly crawling out of a recession raises a big question. 

      At this point our new Senate President Pro Tem and our Speaker of the House indicate that they will not support this expansion but will continue to look at the options that we have to deal with the numerous requirements and expenses of the Health Care Act.  We must act to do what is best for the people of our state but we must also live within our means, a concept that our federal government has not considered.

          If you have questions, you may reach me at my Capitol number 573-751-9465, at the local district number, 660-582-4014, by email at mike.thomson@house.mo.gov or by mail at Room 401B State Capitol Building, Jefferson City, MO 65101.

Missouri attorney general rebukes federal health care law

Despite his party's support for President Barack Obama's health care plan, Democratic Attorney General Chris Koster filed a "friend of the court" brief Monday that aims to remove the mandate requiring most Americans to obtain health insurance.

Koster wrote in the brief that upholding the individual mandate would "imbue Congress with police powers rejected by the Founding Fathers and never before permitted by the Supreme Court."

The brief was filed in response to resolutions passed in the statehouse in January that called on the attorney general to challenge the constitutionality of the health care law and to defend Proposition C.

Unlike filing suit, the amicus brief filed by the attorney general merely serves as a secondary opinion; it does not hold the weight of being a plaintiff or defendent. Rep. Tim Jones, R-St. Louis County, defined an amicus brief as not very significant.

"They don't carry that much water to be honest with you," he said. "It's like somebody saying, 'Yeah, me too.'"

Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder released a disatisfied statement in response to Koster's action. In it, he said Koster does not effectively advocate for the interests of Missouri citizens.

"Koster’s amicus brief in the Florida case, while welcome, is a day late and a dollar short," Kinder said.

Kinder went on to say that the mandate is not severable from the act, and thus Koster's wish of keeping the act intact without the central provision is not a feasible option. His statement called on Koster to take on more direct action. It is, however, too late for Missouri to join the lawsuit because it is already in the appeals process.

"It is crucial that leaders of our state are willing to get in the battle for Missourians' constitutional rights and freedoms, and not just comment from the sideline," Kinder said.

House Speaker Steve Tilley, R-Perryville, disapproved of the fact that Koster pinpointed only one issue in the act.

"His involvement in the process is political in nature, and he has taken a political calculation," Tilley said. "And I would say his political calculation is incorrect if he's identifying just one provision of the bill that's unconstitutional."

Koster's office offered no additional comments and said the document speaks for itself.

Obama's plan, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, mandates that an individual should maintain a minimum amount of coverage or pay a fine. Missouri voters responded to the act in August 2010, when they voted to pass Proposition C, a referendum prohibiting mandatory participation in the health care system.

Koster's brief was filed as an addition to a case filed in Pensacola, Fla., by Republican attorneys general and governors from 26 states. Koster is technically the only Democrat who is directly involved in the case. The Attorney General of Wyoming is a Democrat, but the lawsuit was an action taken by the Republican governor. The Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta is hearing the litigation. So far, three lower court judges have upheld the act, while two, including U.S. District Court Judge Roger Vinson, have taken issue with the central provision of the health care act and ruled it unconstitutional.

The mandate for health insurance is the act's central provision. Koster said he would support the act if legislators cut out that mandate.

House Democratic Floor Leader Mike Talboy, D-Jackson County, said he does not agree with Koster's reasoning in the brief but acknowledged that Koster did what he felt was necessary.

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Stricter abortion regulations pass in Missouri House

Women no longer would be able to get an abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy unless a second doctor approves the procedure, according to a bill passed by the Missouri House Thursday [March 17]. Additionally, doctors may be fined if they perform the late-term procedure without a second opinion. Majority Floor Leader and bill sponsor Tim Jones, R-St. Louis County, said a fetus is viable at 20 weeks of pregnancy. "And it is a child, it's not a fetus; it's not a section of cells, it's a life," he said. "If we're going to start talking about the health and the welfare of the mother and all that, let's talk about the health and the welfare of the other life." Rep. John McCaherty, R-High Ridge, said it is important to remember the restrictions of the bill apply only to women who are more than 20 weeks pregnant. "At five months, my goodness, if you can't make a decision in five months, then there's more of a problem there than just the will to have an abortion," McCaherty said. Some opponents of the bill argued it may be difficult for women of rural areas to access a second doctor, especially in the event of a medical emergency. Others, like Tishuara Jones, D-St. Louis, spoke in opposition of any government control over a woman's decision. "Get your hands out of my belly," she said. "Get them out, because this bill criminalizes the doctor-patient relationship, and it tells women what to do with their bodies and their children." Because the bill and its substitute passed with majority votes, the measure now will go to Senate committees for debate.

Republican-dominated General Assembly tries again for state power over health care

The Republican-dominated General Assembly is making yet another effort to exempt Missouri from President Barack Obama's federal health-care reforms.

The House Rules Committee voted Monday to pass a bill to the House floor that would add Missouri to the multi-state Health Care Compact, which is pushing for state regulation of health care. The compact would supersede federal regulations if Congress agrees.

Regulating health care is too complex for the federal government and should be under state jurisdiction, according to the compact.

The bill passed the committee by a 6-4 vote, even though the bill's sponsor, Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Springfield, was not present.

The bill's co-sponsor, Rep. Timothy Jones, R-Eureka, the Republican floor leader, said he favors the compact as a means of giving states a unified front.

"Compacts have proven to be a good way for states to get together on an issue of similar concern and move those issues forward," Jones said.

He said the bill allows states to manage their own health care policies.

"I think the states are best positioned to be in charge of their own health-care needs for their health-care populations versus the federal government doing it on a one-size-fits-all model," Jones said.

Rep. Mike Colona, D-St. Louis, voted against sending the bill to the House floor.

"My understanding is that it is another attempt, in essence, to undo the federal health-care mandate," Colona said. "I thought we already voted on that once, twice, maybe three times."

Colona acknowledged that Missouri will continue to have a hard time overturning federal health care because federal laws supersede those of the states under the U.S. Constitution.

"Last time I checked, we're still supposed to abide by federal mandate," Colona said. "If the members of the state of Missouri don't want to comply with the federal mandate, then perhaps we need to elect some new congressmen, new senators and change the president. There's nothing we can do about that in the Missouri General Assembly."

The bill will now move to the House for discussion on the floor.