Lawmakers adjourn not knowing when they will be back

BRANSON MO NEWS:

After an efficient two-day session that advanced a $6 billion emergency spending measure, Missouri lawmakers returned to their districts Thursday not knowing when they would be back in Jefferson City.

Following a previous hiatus that included an already scheduled spring break, legislators reconvened this week to reallocate money in the current fiscal year budget to include funds from the federal government, which has pledged billions of dollars to states to help in their efforts to combat COVID-19.

“Passage of the supplemental is about getting resources to front-line health-care workers, hospitals, nursing homes, local communities and those affected by COVID-19,” said Rep. Sheila Solon, R-St. Joseph. “Our plan was to act quickly to pass the supplemental so that the governor could use that money to fight the COVID-19.”

The House passed the measure 147-4, with the Senate voting in favor 28-1.

Local lawmakers were impressed by the bipartisan nature of the vote and the expeditious manner in which it passed.

“You have to take the problem and address it head on, and now is not the time to say whose side is right or wrong,” said Rep. Bill Falkner, R-St. Joseph. “Let’s just do what’s right for the public as a whole.”

Sen. Tony Luetkemeyer R-Parkville, compared what happened in Jefferson City to what members of the U.S. Congress accomplished with the passage of the CARES Act.

“We saw Congress do the same thing, where the U.S. House and the United States Senate came together in a very unusual bipartisan fashion and very quickly passed a critical measure,” he said. “The same thing was mirrored at the state level.”

Uncertainty about

what happens next

Lawmakers adjourned Wednesday with no immediate timetable on when they would return to legislative business. Legislators told News-Press NOW that it’s unlikely the two chambers will reconvene before Republican Gov. Mike Parson’s stay-at-home order is set to expire on Friday, April 24.

“We’ve received some initial reports that would indicate that the virus is likely to peak in Missouri sometime around April 17,” Luetkemeyer said. “So, I think we will reevaluate after April 24 passes and whether it makes sense to come back in session.”

While the legislature was able to pass a supplemental budget to handle emergency spending through the end of June, an even bigger budget with a looming deadline is now at the top of lawmakers’ agendas.

The fiscal year 2021 budget, which starts July 1, is constitutionally mandated to be completed by May 8, but uncertainties surrounding state revenue and potential federal dollars have thrown a wrench in a budget framework that the Senate’s budget chairman has been working on all year.

“There’s a great deal of talk about doing a special session to try to do the fiscal year 2021 budget,” said Sen. Dan Hegeman, a Republican from Cosby who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee.

House member Brenda Shields, R-St. Joseph, echoed Hegeman’s prediction of a special session, saying it was the only way lawmakers could finish the budget outlined in the constitution.

“I think it will be really hard for us to get the budget turned around by May 8,” Shields said. “I’m pretty confident we’ll be in special session to work on the budget.”

The governor would have to call a special session, which could run into June and focus on the budget as well as any other non-budget pieces of legislation waiting to be passed.

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