The practice is called intergovernmental lobbying, or taxpayer-funded lobbying. Local government entities like cities, counties, and fire districts hire lobbyists to represent them in Congress and the state legislature. Those lobbyists then vie for a bigger piece of the government’s pie. As the pie grows, however, so do the taxes needed to pay for it.

In the past 18 months, 53 local entities spent more than $2.6 million on contracts with outside lobbyists. This is just a small sample of the hundreds of publicly funded local institutions that can contract lobbyists. This number does not include the lobbyist’s expenses (such as hotel rooms and dinners out with lawmakers) that are paid for with taxpayer money. It also does not include dues paid to lobbying associations, such as the Missouri Municipal League or Association of Police Chiefs, which receive taxpayer funds from member cities or police districts. These associations have been known to lobby for legislation that would close various public records, such as property tax records or police investigation records. So, in that case, Missourians are paying more to know less.

Clearly, this is a problem. So what can Missourians do about it?

In 2010, Missouri Rep. Shane Schoeller (R-Willard) proposed House Bill 1872 that would have banned lobbyists who receive taxpayer money from “advocating” a position while educating lawmakers and monitoring the legislative session. While the intentions were good, the ban would have been difficult to enforce because lobbyists are constantly doing both. The legislation, predictably, stalled in committee.

Because bans have been relatively unsuccessful here and in other states, perhaps a better start would be increasing transparency when it comes to publicly funded lobbying in the state. The Missouri Ethics Commission (MEC) is charged with monitoring and reporting lobbying activity in the state. However, the data available are incomplete. It tells Missourians little about the entities that hire lobbyists, does not include salaries that those entities pay, and does not make a distinction between private and public employers of lobbyists.

The next option is to go to the local government’s website. This can prove fruitless as well. For example, there are 114 counties in Missouri: 54 of them have websites. None of the 54 provides lobbying information online. In reality, if Missourians want to know exactly how much taxpayer money is going to lobbyists, they would have to send hundreds of Sunshine Law requests, some of which would inevitably go unanswered or remain incomplete. The Show-Me Institute collected its information on the subject in this manner and, speaking from personal experience, the process is far from efficient.

The simple step of requiring the MEC or individual public entity to disclose information about lobbying expenses online would help address the problem in a few ways. First, it would improve Missouri’s overall transparency, which is clouded by minimal lobbying disclosure requirements. Second, it would put the power back in the taxpayers’ hands; no more closed-door deals and secret contracts. Everything would be out in the open. Taxpayers would have access to the information they need to make a decision about whether they support contracting with an outside lobbyist or not.

The issue of intergovernmental lobbying cannot begin to be addressed until the taxpayers are made aware of how their tax dollars are being spent. If local governments continue to keep citizens in the dark about lobbying expenses, the state government will only continue to expand. It is a vicious cycle, with lobbyists advocating increased spending year after year all over the state and no one stopping to think who is footing the bill. Spoiler alert: we are. Taxpayers need to embrace Missouri’s motto when dealing with local governments and say “Show me!” regarding lobbying expenses.

Mary Kate Hopkins is an intern at the Show-Me Institute, which promotes market solutions for Missouri public policy.

The post Missouri’s Taxpayers Lobbying To Pay More Taxes? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Although the case raised many issues, the most interesting was the government’s cost estimate that will accompany the ballot title in November. Here, the voters must be especially diligent in their research if they want to make an informed decision. The estimate suggests that “increased state and local government wage and benefit costs resulting from this proposal will exceed $1 million annually.” This summary, which was highly contested throughout the court hearings, is technically correct — the cost will exceed $1 million — but it does not give an accurate picture of the probable cost, which may be closer to $16 million annually. How can that be? To arrive at the conclusion that the cost to the state would “exceed $1 million annually,” the auditor sent requests to 25 local public employers (such as Linn State Technical College and the City of Columbia) requesting an estimate of how much the wage increase would cost them annually. The auditor landed on the $1 million total because only seven entities responded with an actual estimate. Just seven of the hundreds of public employers in Missouri were counted to come up with this fiscal note summary. Because the auditor cannot force entities to respond with such estimates, it would not be prudent to blame that office. That being said, voters should know that the estimate they will see this November does not provide even a close estimate of the cost. In fact, the expert witness for those challenging the initiative suggested the true cost would exceed at least $16 million annually.

Remember the old adage, buyers beware? Here, it is voters beware.

The language you will see in the voting booth may suggest that Missourians will get a lot of change for a little price, when the reality is quite different.

For more information about the effects of the minimum wage, check out other Show-Me Institute publications on the subject.

The post Minimum Wage Initiative Cost Estimate May Mislead Voters appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Read Audrey Spalding’s case study on blended learning here.

The post Blended Learning: A Solution for Public Schools? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Usually when we write to warn cities about the dangers of TIF, we urge them to consider the failures in other cities or other developments. Officials in the city of Richmond Heights need not look past the city’s own history and, in fact, the history of this particular development. Developers have had their eye on the area since the late 1990s, and two of the proposals (from Michelson Commercial Realty in 2006 and United Plaza in 2010) seemed like they might actually get off the ground before collapsing, mostly due to the state of the economy following the 2008 crash. Now, Richmond Heights is at it again, enticing Pace Properties and Menards with promises of substantial amounts of TIF ($27 million and $24 million, respectfully).

The interesting thing about Hadley Township is that it is not an example of TIF having a negative impact on an area because it cost taxpayers millions and showed less-than-impressive returns — though that is exactly what could happen if the current plans move forward. Instead, this is a case of a city dangling TIF like a carrot in front of developers but failing to complete any of the proposals brought forth. This has left homeowners in limbo; many have moved on or let their homes fall into disrepair because of rumors that they will soon be bought and torn down. It seems like a dismal outlook for the area — either taxpayers are on the hook for more than $50 million of the developments or the neighborhood is left in the blighted state it has reached because of the failures of the past decade. There is, however, a third option: Ditch the TIF and encourage private developers to take advantage of the fact that many of the residents are willing to sell. Private developers, not TIF, could provide the solution that the residents of Hadley Township have been seeking for so long.

The post Richmond Heights Continues To Ignore A History Of TIF Failures appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

A recent Columbia Daily Tribune article shed some light on the extent to which the administration in the UM system has grown to a quite complex and increasingly burdensome size. From the article:

“UM has a president; MU has a chancellor. UM has a vice president of academic affairs, MU has a provost in charge of academics. UM has a vice president of finance; MU has a budget director. UM has a vice president of research; MU has a vice chancellor of research. UM has a PR office as does MU.”

It is clear that there is significant overlap in duties, which adds to confusion in the system but, more importantly, accounts for unnecessary spending in a rapidly tightening budget. This example does not account for other administrations at state universities in Missouri, such as Northeast Missouri State and Truman State. If the UM system focused on cutting back on costly (not to mention superfluous) administrative expansion rather than chipping away at smaller expenditures such as the university press, they might find it easier to fit into a smaller budget in a much shorter time frame.

As I have said previously, less funding from the state government does not mean that educational quality at Missouri’s colleges and universities needs to suffer. Instead, universities should see it as an opportunity to address the bloated state of their administrations and to re-focus their goals as an educational community. Taking an ax to the beast that has become the oversized bureaucracy in the UM system may seem drastic. But it is far more effective in terms of budgetary savings than the wishy-washy goal of “focusing on strategic priorities” — a phrase that sounds as grossly bureaucratic as the board of administrators that produced it.

The post How Many Administrators Are Needed To Run One University System? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Policy analysts for the Show-Me Institute have written extensively about food truck regulations, and now Maplewood has jumped on the regulation bandwagon. City Council members who voted in favor of the ban said they were concerned that the food trucks would “cannibalize” existing businesses in the area. I think they are confusing cannibalism with another “c” word that is vital to any market-driven society: competition. Protectionism is bad for new vendors in the short term, but also bad for consumers in the long run because competition improves choice and helps keep prices reasonable. Yet, in Maplewood, because a new food concept is creative, mobile, and relatively inexpensive, it has brick-and-mortar restaurant owners running to the City Council crying foul. Government should not be putting limitations on ingenuity and entrepreneurship.

As if the food truck prohibition was not enough, Maplewood officials moved forward with the plan to redevelop the Deer Creek Center, likely to be paid in part with TIF. Although the Saint Louis County TIF Commission rejected the request for $8.5 million in public funding in January, it would only take a 5-2 vote from the Maplewood City Council to approve the funding. According to the Post-Dispatch, that is expected to happen when the City Council meets later this month. This is yet another example of a city overriding a county TIF commission so that the city can impose its will on the entire county.

The post Double Trouble In Maplewood appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Take, for example, the Tiger Grotto at Mizzou. It was part of a $50 million recreation center that opened in 2005, paid for by an extra $75-per-semester fee for every student taking more than six credit hours, regardless of usage. The Grotto features palm trees, a heated spa, a lazy river, and an oversized big screen TV, all of which caught the attention of Sports Illustrated in 2005 and won Mizzou the title of Best Rec Center in the Country. For additional charges, students can also sip smoothies poolside at the outdoor Truman Pond or, since 2006, enjoy services like facials and manicures (even teeth whitening and tanning). According to the MizzouRec website, “the Grotto will transform your dullest day into a vacation,” and they proudly promote its “resort quality facilities.” It sounds like Missouri students are paying for a nine-month stay at a Sandals Resort instead of for a top-flight education.

Projects like Tiger Grotto show just how extravagant modern colleges and universities have become. Addressing the rising cost of higher education should perhaps begin with a reassessment of what purpose a university should serve, and whether that purpose is best achieved with flat screen TVs and spa days. Perhaps more funding for the classrooms and less funding for facilities that house smoothie-fueled tanning sessions would solve a few problems that face Missouri’s higher education system. Cutting projects like Tiger Grotto, which drive up student fees, would help keep costs manageable for students as state funding decreases. This whole process would help move higher education in Missouri closer to a model where students pay the true cost of attending college.

The post Meet Me On The Lido Deck After Class appeared first on Show-Me Institute.