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The post Government Surveillance, Vetoes, and Missouri Vs. Florida appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

But six weeks of veto rumblings rolled into a veto thunderclap early this month when most Missourians were preparing for the July 4 holiday weekend. That Thursday, the governor not only vetoed the rebates but also declared his intent to reconvene the legislature in a special session to pass an even more extensive overhaul of Missouri’s income tax:

“We have managed our state resources responsibly and our consistent investment in workforce development and infrastructure is providing a strong foundation for Missouri. Now is the time to take additional steps to help alleviate the strain on Missouri families. Permanent tax cuts that provide real relief to families, senior citizens, the working class, and small businesses every year is a better answer to the inflationary pressures we face, and we look forward to getting it done,” Parson said in the statement.

Parson’s plan includes reducing the individual income tax rate, increasing deductions and allowances for taxpayers and further simplifying the tax code, to create the “largest tax cut in state history,” according to the release.

Under the proposal, the first $16,000 of income for single filers, or $36,000 for joint filers would not be taxed at all, according to a release about the proposal from the Missouri Republican Party.

Special sessions are not unusual but they aren’t terribly common, either; the time and extra cost of bringing legislators back to the capitol often compels elected officials to put off even important reforms until regular legislative business resumes in January. That the governor won’t wait until 2023 to institute tax reform is encouraging.

As to the substance of the proposal as I currently understand it, I am broadly excited by it. Show-Me Institute analysts have long supported eliminating the state income tax, and by increasing the standard deduction for all Missouri filers while simplifying the tax code and reducing the income tax rate, the governor’s current proposal sets out a straightforward framework for dumping the tax over time from both “the top” and “the bottom” of the tax code. My hope is that the legislature’s plan also includes at least a handful of triggers for further tax relief in future years.

I’d be remiss, of course, if I didn’t also suggest that income tax reform should be only one of perhaps a handful of special session topics that could be addressed in the session. Notably, one major regret the governor admitted to after the legislative session was that curriculum transparency legislation didn’t get done this year; this seems like an easy topic to address when the legislature gets back together.

It remains to be seen when exactly the special session will be called, but the odds are it will be called concurrently with the veto override session scheduled for September, when legislators will already be back at the capitol. Hopefully, the special session leads to good tax policies for the state at a minimum, and ideally an opportunity to call up additional topics. Fingers crossed.

The post Governor Parson Opens Door to (At Least) One Special Session appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

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The post Tax Rebate Veto, KC Bus Issues, And The Osage Beach Outlet Mall appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

When Missouri’s funding formula was rewritten in 2005, lawmakers prudently placed a limit on just how much the state’s obligation to fund education could grow from year to year. In 2009, believing gambling tax revenue was going to flush the system full of cash, lawmakers removed the cap, and the amount has grown and grown to an absurd degree. This year, the formula required almost $500 million more than the state was willing to pay.

My colleague James Shuls has been all over this issue for years. As he wrote recently:

When I make a payment on my credit card debt, the next month’s payment is lower. However, when lawmakers increase funding for the foundation formula, it triggers an increase in the funding that will be required for the next go-round. This occurs because the formula is updated bi-annually based on how much a select group of districts spend per pupil.  The legislature gives districts more money, the formula gets recalculated based on this new spending, and the target moves ever upward.   

We have created a vicious circle in which more spending begets more spending.

Now, the legislature is considering reinstating the five-percent cap. This would not necessarily fix the perpetually increasing funding cycle, but it would slow it down. It would make it more feasible for lawmakers to fully fund the foundation formula.

Ending the vicious cycle is a great first step. Here’s hoping this turns the legislature’s attention to broader issues of education reform, like the ones we outlined in 20 for 2020. 

The post House Wisely Overrides Veto on Funding Formula Cap appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The governor foreshadowed this move on Tuesday when he announced a new plan for the state’s two unaccredited districts. Twenty-two higher-performing districts will commit to offering a lower tuition rate for students transferring from Riverview Gardens and Normandy and will provide instructional support for the unaccredited districts. Apparently for him, that is enough for the students in Riverview Gardens and Normandy for at least another year.

But it is not enough for them. Students in these districts should be able to attend the school that best fits their needs, be that a charter school, a virtual school, or a private school. Even one year within a failing school can cause irreparable damage in the life of a student. Students shouldn’t have to wait for support from other districts or their own district to get its act together.

Last year, the governor vetoed the transfer bill because it allowed for the creation of a tiny school voucher program. Legislators cut that provision this year, and still the bill was vetoed.

The post Nixon Vetoes Transfer Bill . . . Again appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

All that said, there actually is a lot to like in these vetoes. For example, the governor vetoed more than $7 million in funds for biodiesel incentives. The state should be eliminating these types of incentives and it is a good thing that Gov. Nixon is cutting back on them. The governor also is vetoing $2 million in funding for the Rolling Stock Tax Credit. The Show-Me Institute has published numerous writings about the desirability on cutting back on these types of tax credits. It is good to see Gov. Nixon trying to do so.

Gov. Nixon’s vetoes could go further. For example, he withheld $5 million from efforts trying to lure the Republican National Convention to Kansas City. There has been a lot said about using government money to try to lure big events, but in this case, the money isn’t necessary because the Republican National Committee has already narrowed its search down to Cleveland and Dallas. Gov. Nixon should have simply vetoed this specific appropriation.

There was a lot to like in the governor’s vetoes. If the legislature was more disciplined, many of the vetoes would not have been necessary. Hopefully, state spending can be controlled going forward.

The post Vetoes, Vetoes, And More Vetoes appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

When the legislative session started, talk about sales tax exemption changes generally focused on a problem the legislature actually needed to address — whether personal training services should constitute “entertainment” for sales tax purposes. Unfortunately, that evolved into a package of legislation (encompassing several bills) that also included sales tax exemptions for manufactured homes, data centers, electricity transmission, and more. The governor is predicting that the cost to the state for the bills could be upwards of $400 million, with hundreds of millions more in costs at the local level.

Whether that top-line total is exactly correct, it is clear that many of these sales tax carve-outs look a great deal like special interest income tax credits when it comes to the narrowness of the benefits and the political considerations that went into extending them. Indeed, legislators have been trying to direct tax credits to data centers in the state for years now. That the legislature decided to throw money at the industry through a different section of the tax laws comes, unfortunately, as little surprise.

The legislature is right to cut taxes for Missourians, but cutting big special deals for favored industries, whether through tax credits or exemptions, should be a non-starter. More to the point, the governor should veto the data center legislation even though doing so would mean better tax policies — which were bound to the fate of the questionable exemptions — will have to be reintroduced next session. If he does, next year, the legislature should take what the state would have foregone with the business exemptions and apply much of it instead to broad tax cuts for businesses. If the state can do without the millions in revenue assigned to many of these special exemptions, it can continue to do without that revenue — but this time through broad tax cuts. That would be a better policy.

The post Governor Should Veto Data Center Tax Exemption Legislation appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

A big congratulations to everyone who worked so hard on this bill. It was a roller coaster of a process, but in the end, this ride ended as a great victory for Missourians in need.

The post From The Jaws Of Defeat: Volunteer Health Services Act Veto Overridden appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Just one problem with that claim: it’s not true. Don’t believe this lawyer? How about . . . the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys?

Sharon Jones, deputy director of the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys, which initially opposed the bill, said “even in times of emergency people need to be careful and they need to be responsible. If you harm someone, you should still be held responsible for the harm that you’ve caused.”

But the bill doesn’t actually grant blanket immunity. Trial lawyers stopped actively working against the legislation after language was added providing for civil penalties if health workers engage in “willful misconduct” or a “gross deviation from the ordinary standard of care,” Jones said. [Emphasis mine.]

What a disaster. Assuming the governor wrote his veto message, there is now a serious question about whether he read the bill before he killed it. Does he stand by his veto message? And the big question now with the upcoming veto session is, will the bill stay dead, or will the veto be overridden?

The post No, The Volunteer Health Services Act Didn’t Offer ‘Blanket Immunity’ To Out-of-State Doctors appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

It seems the governor wants as many people to know about, and feel, these cutbacks as possible. However, the budget facts paint a far less dire picture than the one the governor has sketched out, and to which he is presumably reacting. As the Associated Press‘s David Lieb noted:

. . . Nixon announced more than $400 million of spending restrictions for education, building projects and other government services, even though Missouri began its fiscal year July 1 with a cash balance of around $450 million.

The state apparently has more money in the bank than Nixon has set aside from the budget to supposedly avert a budget deficit. And that’s before we even start talking about the BBTRA, which the governor claims is the driving factor behind his cutbacks. Indeed, with all impacts on the budget included, the fiscal note on the cost of the BBTRA suggests the tax cut would decrease state revenue by about $200 million in 2014 — which is far short of the $400 million the governor withheld.

The state’s education system and other programs are the ones that get hit hard because of the withholding, for seemingly no good reason. The money in the bank doesn’t justify it, and the price tag of the tax cut doesn’t justify it. I’m not so sure Missouri’s schools appreciate their funding being held hostage in the governor’s fight with the legislature, especially when the facts don’t justify the cutbacks.

The post Budget Action In Search Of A Crisis appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The governor’s veto is an affront to the poor and those who would serve them. They deserve better.

The post Unreal: Governor Nixon Vetoes Volunteer Health Services Act appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Nixon, a Democrat, has not publicly commented about the fee-increasing bills. But he already has vetoed the Republican-backed bill that would have gradually cut Missouri’s income taxes by hundreds of millions of dollars annually. Republicans could try to override that veto. But if they fail, and Nixon accepts the fee increases, the result of the 2013 session could be one that few Republicans envisioned: A government that takes more, not less, money from its citizens.

Ensuring that, where reasonable, the costs of government services are associated with the users of the services is typically a laudable objective. Not every cost of every state service should be distributed evenly to all taxpayers. Yet, if the net effect of a year’s legislation is not just higher state fees but higher costs to taxpayers generally, then we are headed in precisely the wrong public policy direction.

And that’s where things stand today; if the tax cut veto is not overridden and the fees become law, that may end up being what the legislature “achieved” in 2013. Legislators who supported the fee increases but opposed, and may oppose again, the tax cut, may have some explaining to do back in their districts. Stay tuned.

The post With Fee Hikes Pending And A Tax Cut Vetoed, Could The 2013 Legislature End Up…Raising Your Taxes? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Of course, their verbiage could have been a little more diverse. Under the headline, “Jay Nixon boldly rejects destructive Missouri tax bill,” the Star declared:

This is what a strong-willed, plain-spoken governor fighting for what’s best for Missouri looks like.

Speaking Wednesday in Kansas City, Jay Nixon eviscerated and vetoed a tax bill approved by the General Assembly.

Meanwhile across the state, the Post-Dispatch declared under the headline “FAIR: Nixon eviscerates GOP arguments for ‘ill-conceived’ tax cut bill”…

In an unusually long veto message that absolutely eviscerated the arguments the GOP made in passing the bill, Mr. Nixon called it an “ill-conceived, fiscally irresponsible experiment,” and that was just for starters. It was among the boldest, clearest and most significant actions the usually cautious governor has taken.

Noted. The approved adjective for the governor’s actions is “bold.” The approved adverb is “boldly.” The approved verb is “eviscerate.” Reminds me a bit of the “secret word” they used to use on Pee-Wee Herman’s show years ago.

Of course, there is nothing surprising about two of the state’s major dailies getting foursquare behind the governor spending more and returning less to taxpayers or even — intentionally or unintentionally — coordinating editorial language. The Star and Post-Dispatch‘s proclivities are well known, and while the words they’re using these days may be “secret” in the Pee-Wee sense, the newspapers’ politics are as transparent as they could possibly be. This is just another exhibition of the point.

The post Going Pee-Wee: Missouri Dailies ‘Boldly’ ‘Eviscerate’ Tax Cut, Laud Veto appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

First, according to Nixon, Missouri is already a low-tax state. I addressed this concern in an earlier post. In some areas, Missouri is a low-tax state; in others, it isn’t. Regarding income taxes, Missouri has a higher income tax rate than most of its neighbors, including Kansas and Illinois. If you factor in the fact that both Saint Louis and Kansas City have earnings taxes, the rates are significantly higher.

Second, Nixon claims that HB 253 would increase taxes on prescription drugs. Patrick Ishmael wrote a blog post concerning this issue. Officials with the Missouri Department of Revenue (DOR) say the legislation keeps the sales tax exemption in place. According to DOR officials, “the language provided to Legislative Research by the Missouri Department of Revenue protected the sales tax exemption for prescription drugs.” That’s also what I came away with; I read the bill.

Nixon also criticizes HB 253 for removing the sales tax exemption for college textbooks. That would be bad…why? I’m in favor of expanding the sales tax base and I don’t think college textbooks should be exempt from the sales tax. Yes, it would add more to the cost of going to college, but as a college graduate, I can assure you, textbooks were not the biggest cost factor for many of my peers and me (and I had scholarships).

I will have more to say about Nixon’s veto message. There is a lot in it to digest and the legislature will have its hands full if it wants to override the veto. However, while I do not think HB 253 is perfect, I do think it is a step in the right direction and will make Missouri a more attractive place to do business.

The post Missouri House Bill 253…Vetoed! (Part I) appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

But if good policy wasn’t a sufficient reason to override the widely expected veto of the tax cut before, then self-preservation might be — an incentive the governor has now offered up through his remarks. If there is in fact a “tax increase” in this tax cut, legislators cannot afford to have nothing to show for it and no way to fix it. That leaves them with only one option: preserve the tax cut and correct the drafting error. Voting not to override a veto of the tax cut would close that door; voting to override the veto would prop it open.

But stripping away all the inside-baseball stuff, this whole situation boils down to one thing: that the governor would rather spend taxpayers’ money on new state programs, such as an expansion of Medicaid, than return the money to taxpayers. That’s sad, and I wish the governor would just come out and tell us as much rather than dance around the fact. If nothing else, it would save taxpayers the money spent on all the governor’s press releases hinting at this reality.

The post Gov. Nixon Unexpectedly Gives Legislators Another Reason To Override A Tax Cut Veto appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The post McGraw Milhaven – David Stokes on KTRS appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Specifically, the vetoed legislation aimed to shelter public entities from disclosing minutes, votes, and records; it also allowed for closed meetings.

Without public access to important information — whether it is school district board minutes or the budget of fire protection districts — injustices may go unnoticed and our public officials may be tempted to act in unethical and elusive ways.

Take, for example, a recent embezzlement scandal in Brentwood. As Chad Carson reported, the city administrator of the suburban municipality was found to have stolen nearly $30,000 of city funds. That money, largely from tax receipts, was thrown away at a riverboat casino. Increased government accountability is the only effective solution Missouri citizens have to prevent such abuses in the future.

It is improbable to assume that the general public will suddenly besiege public entities with information requests — commonly known as Sunshine Law Requests. Therefore, the protection of this right is critical to policy analysts and journalists statewide who, in their endeavor for truth, rely on accountability. After all, your government cannot be accountable without transparency.

We often chastise our elected officials’ performance — ironic, since we elect them. However, when they strive to bolster the sense of public duty, as Gov. Nixon illustrated here, some praise and an attaboy are due.

So now, even as the mercury seems to higher and higher each day, Missourians can feel good about greater openness, transparency, and accountability in government.

The post Veto by Nixon Secures Transparency of MO Government appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The other veto is just strange. It is not that I support the bill as much as I find the reason for the veto perplexing. The Governor vetoed HB 1008 because he felt it might authorize toll roads in Missouri. Of course, I want more toll roads in Missouri. But the legislation says nothing about tolling, and the author of the bill, Rep. Thomas Long, says it has nothing to do with tolls. But even if it did have something to do with tolls, allowing private parties to finance and operate highways and bridges would be good for Missouri’s economy, not harmful.

I repeat that I think Missouri should allow line-item vetoes for more than just budget bills.

And a hat tip to Combest for the original link to the story.

The post Two Bad Transportation Vetoes appeared first on Show-Me Institute.