Airport Advisory Group Recommends New Terminal Plan

Posted on by Joseph Miller

Today, the Kansas City Airport Terminal Advisory Group (ATAG) recommended that the city move forward with a $1.2 billion new terminal plan for Kansas City International Airport (MCI). Their recommendation flies in the face of clear opposition from the airlines and revelations that the new terminal plan is far more expensive than a simple renovation of the airport.

That ATAG recommended the new terminal plan is inexplicable based on facts, but not so surprising given just how tilted the scales really were. Nearly all the information at ATAG meetings came from the authors of the new terminal plan (Kansas City Aviation Department), the only real option presented in any detail was the new terminal plan, and the process for selecting a conclusion was weighted in favor of the new terminal plan.

Fortunately, the ATAG’s recommendation is by no means binding. MCI and its airlines have already signed an agreement allowing them to basically rewrite the plan in conjunction with the Aviation Department. In addition, Kansas City voters will get a say on whether a new terminal is built. Hopefully, fiscal discipline and common sense will prevail and voters will permanently ground this boondoggle.

Our full position on the new terminal plan is outlined in this presentation from February:

It’s Difficult To Compete With Free

Posted on by James V. Shuls

If it were your decision and you could select any type of school, what type of school would you select in order to obtain the best education for your child? This question was posed to 660 Missourians in a poll that the Show-Me Institute and the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice released this week. In their responses, Missouri voters overwhelmingly demonstrated that it is difficult to compete with free.

Only one-third of respondents indicated they would select the regular public school system. Thirty-nine percent indicated they would select a private school, making it the most common response. Another 21 percent indicated they would choose to homeschool their children or send them to a public charter school.

Q7 Friedman Missouri Poll

These responses stand in stark contrast to reality – nearly nine out of 10 students in Missouri attend public schools. Why this mismatch between preferences and actual choices? Cost and access.

Public charter schools are only located in Saint Louis and Kansas City and are limited on where they can expand. Private schools cost additional money. As anyone with a cursory knowledge of basic economics knows, demand decreases when cost rises. In other words, many parents are more likely to choose a free public school than they are to pay for a private school – regardless of preference.

But public schools do not have to be the only option for parents. Currently, 24 states and Washington, D.C., have school choice programs. Kansas became the most recent state to adopt a private school choice program with the creation of a tax credit scholarship program.

There is a clear desire for expanded educational options in Missouri. Yet, there is entrenched opposition to school choice from education establishment groups. These groups claim to oppose choice because they want to protect students. It seems obvious, they actually oppose school choice because they want to protect their advantage over the costly private competition. That is why economist Milton Friedman once said:

There is no doubt what the key obstacle is to the introduction of market competition into schooling: the perceived self-interest of the educational bureaucracy.

Opposition to school choice stands in the face of clear support among Missouri voters (including rural voters) and in the face of evidence that school choice works.

Paul DiPerna, the research director at the Friedman Foundation, and I discuss the new poll on this segment of Choice Media’s Reform School.

Going Too Far To Limit Voter Input

Posted on by David Stokes

There are at least two efforts in the Missouri General Assembly to prevent the ability of local voters to restrict tax incentives within their community. I think these limitations are a very bad idea, to say the least. Both Senate Bill 672 and SB 693 have had the following amendment attached to them:

2. No political subdivision of this state shall by ballot measure impose any restriction on any public financial incentive authorized by statute.

This proposal is almost certainly in response to the attempt to limit tax incentives for Peabody and other energy companies within the City of Saint Louis. A judge’s order turned away that ballot initiative. While I certainly agreed with the attempt to limit tax subsidies, I was never comfortable with the way the initiative targeted one industry. So, you didn’t hear me objecting to the judge’s ruling. Furthermore, I have, in the past, supported legislative preemption of initiative petitions in certain cases, so I am not saying a referendum should always trump local officials.

However, a blanket prohibition against any local votes against the use of tax incentives such as Tax Increment Financing (TIF), etc., goes way too far. This is terrible public policy and improperly restricts local voter rights. If a city or county has an allowance for initiative petitions under their charter, they should be allowed to use it. If local voters want to reduce or eliminate the use of TIF, Transportation Development Districts (TDDs), Community Improvement Districts (CIDs), Enhanced Enterprise Zones (EEZs), abatements, etc., via their local tax dollars, they should be able to do so.

Attempts to use initiative petitions after the fact against approved TIFs have failed for several legal reasons. However, there should be no legal problem with preemptively prohibiting corporate welfare in a community, as long as the prohibition is even and not targeted at select industries. (Feel free to tell me how I am wrong there, lawyers, but the mere existence of these amendments tells me that is correct.)

These amendments are trying to create a legal roadblock against citizen involvement and input into how people’s own tax dollars are spent, and that would be unfortunate for Missouri.

Show-Me Now! Food Trucks Fight Red Tape

Posted on by David Stokes

Update (April 2026): More than a decade later, food trucks in St. Louis are still fighting the same battles, most recently after a bill to expand their operating areas was stalled when the Cardinals objected to losing exclusive vending control around Busch Stadium.

We caught up with some food truck vendors at the 2014 St. Louis Food Truck rally last Saturday. David Stokes asked them about the their fight against red tape in St. Louis city and county. Things are getting better, but there’s still work to be done.

We Have A Tax Cut: Missouri Legislature Overrides Governor’s Veto

Posted on by Patrick Ishmael

It was a long road, but after a 23-8 override vote in the Missouri Senate yesterday and a 109-46 vote in the Missouri House today, Missouri has its first individual income tax cut in nearly a century. Senate Bill 509’s passage is a victory for taxpayers that stands in stark contrast to tax handouts, like Boeing’s, that have bedeviled reformers’ attempts to take the cronyism out of the state’s economic development efforts. This first tax cut is a small but important first step to ensuring every Missourian, not just a select few with special connections in Jefferson City, is empowered to make this state better.

Missouri is not a “low-tax state” yet, but today’s vote is a welcome opening salvo to get us there.

Survey Says . . . Missourians Dramatically Underestimate Education Spending

Posted on by James V. Shuls

Today, Missouri lawmakers voted to override Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon’s veto of a tax cut bill. Immediately, opponents of the tax cut began decrying the legislature’s actions. They claim that this will lead to drastic cuts in education spending. First, it is important to note that these scare tactics are just that – scare tactics. On the Show-Me Daily blog, my colleague Michael Rathbone has shown how these predictions relied on cooking the books in order to come up with a loss of funds to education. With that said, it is important to understand why this type of scare tactic is so common and effective. To do that, you need look no further than the report that the Show-Me Institute and the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice released today.

We conducted a poll of Missouri voters and asked them a number of questions regarding school funding and school choice. When we asked participants how much they think we spend on each student per year, we found that the vast majority of Missourians have no idea. Seventy-two percent of Missouri voters either underestimated or were not even willing to guess how much Missouri spends in total expenditures per pupil. Approximately one-fifth of Missourians estimated that we spend less than $4,000 per pupil in current expenditures. In reality, we spend $9,400.

Q4 Friedman Missouri Poll

How does not knowing the facts allow for scare tactics to work? It’s simple. When people have more information, they are less likely to believe outlandish claims.

During the poll, we tested the impact of having spending information. We found that when individuals were told how much we spend on students, they were much less likely to say that spending is “too low.” There is room for honest debate in politics, even when it comes to education funding; but this debate should be based on the facts.

Q5 Friedman Missouri Poll

You can find the full poll on the Show-Me Institute and Friedman Foundation websites.

Normandy Superintendent Calls For Passage Of Senate Bill 493

Posted on by James V. Shuls

Ty McNichols

“Now SB493 needs to become law this session so our district can retain the talented staff that is so hard to recruit to an urban district.” Those were the words of Normandy Superintendent Tyrone McNicols in a commentary on St. Louis Public Radio this weekend.

As readers of the Show-Me Daily blog know, Senate Bill 493 would fix many of the problems with the transfer law and would create a local private option for students. This local private option would allow students in unaccredited schools to attend a nearby nonsectarian private school.

It is this local private option that has the alphabet soup of education groups (MASA, MSBA, MNEA, etc.) railing against SB 493. As I have said before, the education establishment has taken an all-or-nothing approach on this issue. They are not interested in compromise. They are solely interested in stopping school choice.

Missouri Sen. John Lamping (R-Dist. 24) put it this way during a recent Show-Me Institute panel discussion about the topic [emphasis mine]:

The establishment is quite comfortable with nothing happening. They can’t say it publicly, but they’re very comfortable with nothing happening. Normandy will be bankrupt by July, they will lapse the district, they’ll merge with the surrounding districts. Riverview Gardens will go bankrupt next year; they’ll do the same thing. And, two or three years from now, a neighboring district will probably go through the same process of unaccreditation and becoming bankrupt. The establishment is fine with that. They will not give any reform in exchange for fixing the system.

If this bill does not pass, it is the establishment that will have killed it and in effect, sealed the fate of the Normandy School District.

Superintendent Ty McNichols doesn’t want to see that happen. He recognizes that “no bill is ever perfect, and there are issues in the bill that are controversial,” but he also recognizes when it is time for compromise. This is just such a time.

Video: Our School Choice Event Is Now Online

Posted on by James V. Shuls

On April 25, the Show-Me Institute was delighted to have Missouri Sen. John Lamping (R-Dist. 24), Missouri Sen. Maria Chappelle-Nadal (D-Dist. 14), and Missouri Speaker of the House Tim Jones (R-Dist. 110) join us for a panel discussion about tax credit scholarships and school choice. Our event received some great coverage from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and St. Louis Public Radio.

The lawmakers were candid and provided a great discussion about school choice and a potential fix to the problems with the inter-district transfer law. The Post-Dispatch’s editorial board pulled one comment during the lawmaker’s panel discussion and its press coverage gave a scathing criticism. Unfortunately, members of the editorial board were not there in person and did not get to hear all of the comments.

Well, they can watch them now. The panel discussion as well as the other presentations are now available.

Maybe they can pull some other quotes. Here are some of my favorites:

Sen. Lamping:

Missouri has a very strong filibuster. We have 34 senators and two or three or four senators can stop just about anything. But, I’m not here to tell you that two or three senators are opposed to choice. I’m here to tell you that institutional education in Missouri is the single strongest lobby that is in the capitol, bar none.

Speaker Jones:

This [school choice] will not be the end of public education as we know it. How do we know that? Because many, many, many states have incorporated many of these things we’ve talked about and they have vibrant public education school systems and private education systems, charters. Some even have vouchers and they still have public schools. So, I think it is time to try something new and give people a choice.

Sen. Chappelle-Nadal:

There is not going to be a bill without the private option. I know that. Ray Charles would know that.

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