Associate Press, April 16, 2013

Rallying with one of the largest crowds of the year at the Missouri Capitol, Gov. Jay Nixon urged activists on Tuesday to implore reluctant Republican lawmakers to expand Medicaid coverage to hundreds of thousands of lower-income adults.

The Democratic governor headlined a nearly hour-long pep rally that his administration says drew more than 1,000 people to the Capitol – a crowd so large that some state employees were asked to park their vehicles elsewhere Tuesday to make way for the busloads of rally participants. The event featured business leaders, doctors, pastors and police officers, all lending their support to the Medicaid expansion called for under President Barack Obama’s health care law.

Nixon, who has been public office for 26 years, praised the proposed Medicaid expansion as the greatest opportunity to do good for the greatest number of people in his political career.

“Let’s make sure that the words we’ve said here are turned into action up there,” said Nixon, pointing upward to the third floor of the Capitol, where the House and Senate chambers are located.

Yet Tuesday’s rally may have done little to change Republican legislative leaders, who repeatedly have rejected a traditional Medicaid expansion while citing concerns about its potential long-term costs.

“In my opinion, a supermajority of Missourians, who I consider my constituents, do not want us to implement any form of Obamacare in this state,” House Speaker Tim Jones, R-Eureka, told reporters as Nixon participated in the rally.

Obama’s 2010 health care law envisioned a Medicaid expansion as one of the primary means of providing health coverage to those currently without insurance. A Supreme Court ruling last summer made the Medicaid expansion optional for states but left in place a powerful financial incentive. States that expand adult Medicaid coverage to 138 percent of the poverty level – about $15,800 for an individual or $32,500 for a family of four – can receive full federal funding for the first three years, starting in 2014. The federal share will be gradually scaled back to 90 percent by 2020.

Nixon says about 300,000 Missouri residents could eventually gain coverage under the Medicaid expansion – a one-third increase in the size of the current program. He also contends the influx of federal money will spur thousands of new jobs and generate more than enough tax revenue and savings to offset the additional state dollars that eventually would be spent on the program.

A Republican-led House committee has endorsed an alternative Medicaid plan that would add some adults to the rolls, though not as many as Obama’s administration has said is needed to qualify for the enhanced federal funding. The GOP plan also would remake Medicaid to more closely resemble private-sector insurance.

But rally participants said it would be foolish to insist upon overhauling Medicaid while delaying the receipt of the federal money.

“Postponing Medicaid expansion until it is perfectly reformed is like leaving shipwrecked passengers treading water and sinking because somebody thinks that the rescue vessel needs some business-process improvement,” said Dr. Heidi Miller, of the Family Health care Center in St. Louis.

Miller predicted that if Missouri waits even one more year to expand Medicaid, doctors and nurses would leave to take more lucrative jobs in states that are enlarging Medicaid.

Among the arguments that Nixon has been making for a Medicaid expansion is the fact that the federal health care law cuts funding to hospitals for the cost of treating uninsured patients beginning in 2014. Without adding those uninsured patients to the Medicaid rolls, hospitals stand to lose money, Nixon has said.

Yet Obama may have partially undercut that argument last week by proposing to delay the federal funding cut to hospitals by a year. Some Republican Missouri lawmakers have cited that as an additional reason not to act this year on a Medicaid expansion.

Lisa Church, a spokeswoman for Bothwell Regional Health Center in Sedalia, stressed Tuesday that Obama’s funding-cut delay is only a proposal.

“I’m afraid that it gives people a false sense of security, and this really is an urgent issue,” said Church, who was near the front of the audience at the rally.

Participants held red-and-white signs that said such things as “Strengthen Medicaid Now” and wore stickers proclaiming: “Full Medicaid Expansion Now.”

Pastor Ron Webb, of Mount Calvary Powerhouse Church in Poplar Bluff, began the event with a praying that legislators “would do the righteous thing, and that’s to vote for Medicaid expansion. “

Associate Press, April 16, 2013

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — The Missouri Senate has rejected a bill that would have allowed additional water and sewer companies to seek permission for surcharges to build new infrastructure.

Currently, only water companies in St. Louis County can impose such a surcharge between formal rate cases. Other water companies must get approval for a rate increase from the state Public Service Commission.

The legislation defeated by a 17-16 vote Tuesday would have allowed certain water companies across the state to levy the surcharge between cases. The surcharge could have been used for replacement lines and meters in addition to energy efficiency initiatives.

Supporters said the process worked in St. Louis County and should be opened up to other companies. Opponents said it would have raised utility rates without proper oversight.
—
The water bill is SB297

St. Louis Beacon, September 3, 2012

Legal challenges won’t go forward to get initiatives raising the minimum wage and restricting “payday” loans on the ballot, according to organizers of the two efforts.

Secretary of State Robin Carnahan’s office announced in August that initiative petitions to raise the minimum wage to $8.25 an hour and restrict interest rates on payday loans didn’t receive enough signatures in two St. Louis-based congressional districts. Spokespeople for the campaigns signaled they would pursue legal means to reexamine the decision.

But the two groups announced in a joint press release sent out on Monday morning that they would “suspend” their legal challenge, noting that the groups “reluctantly concluded that the legal hurdles erected by the payday lending industry, their allies and their lawyers are too high for us to cross before the Sept. 21 deadline for finalizing the November ballot.”

“The people of Missouri have the right to place important public policy issues on the ballot. Initiative petitions should be a matter of volunteer efforts and debate,” said Rev. Dr. Jim Hill, president of Missouri Faith Voices, in a statement. “Unfortunately, opponents have taken that right from the people, and subjected it into a battle of legal attrition.”

Added Martin Rafanan, executive director of Gateway 180: Homelessness Reversed: “We are sad to report that the payday industry and minimum wage opponents’ unprecedented legal challenges effectively disenfranchised thousands of Missourians. It is another example of big monied corporate interests displacing the people’s interests in the democratic process.”

The press release added that the groups would continue pursuing their efforts in the future.

The minimum wage item would have raised the state’s threshold from $7.25 an hour to $8.25 an hour. Among other things, it also would have adjusted the state’s minimum wage based on the Consumer Price Index. The “payday loan” initiative would have capped interest rates on such loans at 36 percent.

Ballot items that will appear on November’s ballot include a tobacco tax increase, an effort to remove state control of the St. Louis Police Department and a constitutional amendment to reconfigure how the state’s judges to the Missouri Supreme Court and Missouri Court of Appeals are selected.

Voters will also decide on a measure barring the governor from setting up a health-insurance exchange through an executive order.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch, September 6, 2012

Robbery with a pen will continue to be legal in Missouri with the announcement Monday that Missourians for Responsible Lending had abandoned its campaign to cap payday loan interest rates in the face of well-financed opposition from the industry.

What this means is that instead of capping the interest rates and fees for payday loans at a relatively reasonable 36 percent, they will continue to soar to their average rate of 445 percent annually.

What this also means is that deep-pocketed, out-of-state loan sharks playing a shell game with campaign finance won. Poor people lost.

The grass-roots petition supporters could have benefited from a payday loan to their campaign, but they wouldn’t have been able to handle the usurious interest rates and fees any better than the poor and working-class people who get the predatory loans.

The decision to suspend efforts to get initiatives on the state’s Nov. 6 ballot to cap the payday loans and to raise the state’s minimum wage has a wider impact than on just payday borrowers and underpaid workers. It also means that the ballot initiative — one of the last methods left for groups of average citizens to try to change the law — is endangered.

“This is a real challenge to participatory democracy,” the Rev. David Gerth, head of Metropolitan Congregations United, which worked on behalf of the two ballot initiatives, said Tuesday. “I wouldn’t say it’s impossible to get an initiative on the ballot, but it is very, very difficult to win.”

The organization fighting the payday loan industry, and Give Missourians a Raise, the group seeking to raise the minimum wage, had combined efforts. Each initiative needed about 95,000 signatures from across the state, and the groups submitted petitions with more than 350,000 signatures.

Various election authorities, including in the city of St. Louis, had questioned the validity of enough signatures to keep the initiatives off the ballot. Supporters thought they could challenge those ballot counts and get the signatures approved by the Sept. 21 deadline.

They said Monday that their well-heeled opponents had put too many legal hurdles in their way to overcome by the deadline.

“Since beginning this campaign more than a year ago, we have faced an opposition unrestrained by money, morality, truth or concern for the economic dignity of our neighbors and family members,” said the Rev. James Bryan, treasurer for the lending cap group.

Here’s all Missourians need to know about that process:

The payday loan industry spent more than $2 million fighting to keep this common sense measure off the ballot, knowing full well that if it made it there, it would pass. Nearly all of that money was funneled through a Kansas City non-profit that, to date, hasn’t revealed its donors.

What are they afraid of?

Supporters of the initiatives, meanwhile, spent $600,000, all of it accounted for, according to Missouri Ethics Commission reports.

Supporters put their names on the line. Opponents didn’t.

That Missouri law allows this is as unjust as charging poor people more than 1,000 percent interest on loans they’ll never be able to pay back.

Rev. Gerth said petition supporters had done their best to keep costs down, getting help from churches and synagogues across the state and using hundreds of locally trained volunteers to collect signatures, but they just didn’t have the money to keep fighting.

Of the 143 ballot initiatives submitted to the secretary of state this year, four have been certified for the Nov. 6 ballot. Two were referred by the Legislature, one was largely funded by the American Cancer Society and a coalition of health-care and education interests, and the last, on local control of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department, was largely funded by millionaire investor Rex Sinquefield.

State lawmakers need to do two things to make it easier for ordinary citizens to have a say in government. First, make it illegal for wealthy donors to hide behind layers of secrecy. If money is free speech, and corporations are people, then make the corporations put their names on their speech.

Second, pass a version of the bill that was supported last session by state Auditor Tom Schweich, a Republican, and Secretary of State Robin Carnahan, a Democrat, that would have added an extra step to the initiative process. Modeled after an Oregon law, it would require 1,000 sponsoring petition signatures to weed out those who aren’t serious about the process.

Those who want payday loan companies to stop preying on Missouri’s poor say they’ll get back to work passing a new law that merely would put the Show-Me State in line with most other states, with the same sort of interest limits Congress imposed on payday loan companies that were taking advantage of military families.

Missouri lawmakers should back their efforts by evening the playing field.

Now it wants to get in your pocket again!

Senate Bill 207 and House Bill 398, virtually identical bills, are working their way through the legislative process in the Missouri General Assembly.  The bills would let investor-owned utilities raise rates automatically — through a mechanism called an Infrastructure System Replacement Surcharge — without any meaningful review by the Public Service Commission.  These utilities are Ameren Missouri, KCP&L, KCP&L GMO and Empire District.

The bills gut Missouri’s rational general rate-making process that has given consumers at least a fighting chance against the utilities for many decades.

Over the past five years Ameren was allowed to raise its rates $1.1 billion — 43 percent.  That cost consumers $2.8 billion more, just when they were trying to make ends meet during the economic downturn that devastated many families.

No other state allows anything like this broadly defined surcharge.  It will drive up the cost of doing business in Missouri and could cause businesses to leave.

To read the bills, go to Senate.MO.Gov or House.MO.Gov.

St. Louis Public Radio has launched a new project that will keep track monthly of gifts and money lobbyists give to Missouri legislators.  Its first report tracks expenditures in the first two months of 2013.  In January and February Ameren Corp., provider of electricity and gas to a large portion of the state, topped the list with expenditures of more than $25,000.

KWMU, University of Missouri – St. Louis, April 10, 2013

St. Louis Public Radio has launched a new data-oriented project that will be keeping track of all the money Missouri legislators receive from lobbyists.

In just two months this year, Missouri legislators and statewide officials received more than a third of a million dollars in gifts from lobbyists. Expensive meals, basketball tickets and clothes are all common gifts to the people that craft our laws and govern us.

Probably none of this is surprising to you. It’s fairly understood that lobbyists spend a lot of money on public officials. But there hasn’t been an easy way to break down that large, and often foreign-seeming $338,396  that lobbyists spent on politicians.

That’s why St. Louis Public Radio is starting a new project to keep track of that money, and hopefully answer the questions of who’s giving it, who’s receiving it, and what it’s going toward.

St. Louis Public Radio Report on Lobbyist Spending

Springfield New-Leader, March 2, 2013

Kansas City Star, March 1, 2013

Kansas City Star, March 8, 2013

St. Louis Post-Dispatch, March 1, 2013

The St. Louis Beacon, April 2, 2013

The Missouri House has passed a new state budget without Gov. Jay Nixon’s sought-after Medicaid expansion, but that doesn’t mean Republicans are dropping the issue entirely.

The House Government Oversight and Accountability Committee is slated to vote Wednesday on HB700, a bill proposed by state Rep. Jay Barnes, R-Jefferson City, to change the state’s current Medicaid program dramatically.

But word already is circulating that Barnes’ bill, even if it gets through the House, will have a tough time in the state Senate. Fellow Republicans and most Democrats oppose his plan.

Meanwhile, Nixon is continuing to take his pro-Medicaid expansion tour on the road. He was in Wentzville today; last week, the governor was in Kirkwood.

And on Wednesday, the governor plans to be back in the state Capitol to meet with the the House Republican caucus in what is expected to be another pitch to expand Medicaid, as sought by the federal Affordable Care Act.

The federal government would pick up all the additional costs for the first three years, and cover at least 90 percent thereafter.

So far, House Republicans haven’t embraced that plan, instead looking for other alternatives. Which is where Barnes’ proposal fits in.

The House oversight panel conducted a hearing last week on Barnes’ bill, which would result in dropping some people — including children — currently on the rolls and then adding others.

Barnes chairs the House committee and told the Beacon in a recent interview that his bill constitutes “a plan to fundamentally transform Medicaid system into the most market-based system not just in the entire country, but in the entire history of the program.”

Barnes said, “We are attempting to inject price competition into a system that for 45 years has been sorely lacking price competition. So we’re empowering participants to make their own health-care decisions and to do so in a cost-conscious manner that will save taxpayer money.”

Among other things, Barnes’ bill would place income eligibility for the program at 100 percent of the federal poverty level. It would also reduce eligibility in other areas, including children’s health care.

The proposed poverty-line for eligibility is five times the state’s current limit (19 percent) for adult participation on Medicaid, but it’s less than the 138 percent required under the federal Affordable Care Act to receive federal money.

“The areas in which we’re reducing eligibility are populations that are going to have access to robust subsidies in a federal health-insurance exchange,” Barnes said. “So for example, a family of two making about $20,000 a year will have to pay about $34 a month for health insurance. That’s a reasonable cost for somebody to pick up. It will empower them to pick their own plan.”

Barnes’ plan would provide state contracts to competing insurers and would give patients incentives to choose lower-costs plans.

“Study after study has shown people who have private health plans get better health results versus people who are on Medicaid,” Barnes said. “And some of those studies even show that’s true controlling for income. And so we give participants better care – and we do it in a way that’s much cheaper for Missouri taxpayers.”

The legislation is contingent on the federal government granting a waiver to Missouri, Barnes said. That’s important, because one of the tradeoffs of getting the enhanced federal funding is for states to raise the eligibility level to 138 percent of the federal poverty level.

“This is an all or nothing proposition. Either the federal government allows red states to craft solutions that work for them or we don’t do it,” Barnes said. “The fiscal note is either zero – because the Obama administration refuses to back off its ideological stance on a one-size-fits-all Medicaid. Or it’s positive fiscally for over $1 billion over eight years.”

Bill’s fate may depend on feds
Barnes’ plan has sparked a mixed reaction among groups watching the Medicaid battle closely.

Joe Pierle, chief executive of the Missouri Primary Care Association — which backs the Medicaid expansion — said in a statement that Barnes’ bill “is the beginning of a process to bring much-needed stability and predictability to the state’s health-care system.”

Barnes’ bill, he said, “begins to build the framework for a Missouri solution to leverage our federal tax dollars to expand access to affordable health coverage for the working poor.

“Transforming the system and providing affordable health coverage to the working poor are not mutually exclusive,” he said. “Both can be done at the same time.”

Joan Bray — a former Missouri senator who is now the head of the Consumers Council — said in an e-mail to supporters that Barnes’ bill “would introduce a number of changes to the state’s Medicaid program but will never be implemented because the bill expands eligibility only to 100 percent of the federal poverty level.”

“Secretary Kathleen Sebelius of the Health and Human Services Department has made it clear that states will receive Medicaid reimbursement only if they provide service to people with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level – nothing less,” Bray said. “Without this, Missouri’s bill is meaningless.”

State House Speaker Tim Jones, R-Eureka, released a 1,217-word statement last Thursday that Barnes’ bill “does provide a solid starting point from which we can work toward the kind of Medicaid system our state needs both today and for the years to come.

“Regardless of how we proceed, we will be dependent on the federal government to grant us a waiver that will empower our state to innovate and transform our Medicaid system,” Jones said in his statement. “The way Medicaid expansion was structured by the White House gave states a take-it-or-leave-it ultimatum when it comes to the federal dollars that are available.”

Jones told the press last week, according to a recording from Missourinet, that “we’ve got to work through this process; it’s a long legislative process.”

It’s also unclear whether the House proposal will gain legislative traction. The Columbia Daily Tribune reported earlier this week that Senate President Pro Tem Tom Dempsey, R-St. Charles, said that Barnes’ bill would have a dim chance in the Missouri Senate. Passage in that chamber is key, since bills there can be held up by a handful of lawmakers.

Gov. Jay Nixon comments on Rep. Jay Barnes’ Medicaid bill, a possible alternative to increasing eligibility to 138 percent of the federal poverty level.

For his part, Nixon was in Kirkwood last Tuesday to drum up support for expanding Medicaid to 138 percent of the federal poverty. After his address, he told reporters that he was heartened that Barnes’ bill was a start of a serious discussion on the issue.

It’s “good that there’s movement forward in the House,” Nixon said. Barnes’ bill “will be a vehicle that can get this to the finish line. And that’s important. So I think it’s solid progress that people are working together to move the bill forward.”

Nixon cites other states’ compromise approaches
Asked about whether any proposal would have to expand Medicaid up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level, Nixon said, “138 percent is what the federal government says that it needs to have.”

“But there are lots of ways to get to 138,” Nixon said. “You could put some of these dollars through an exchange, for example, so folks would have a way to go on the marketplace. So the way Arkansas did it and the way some other states are doing it. So there’s lots of ways to get to 138 that aren’t necessarily just move Medicaid to 138.”

Nixon was referring to how the federal government gave the green light, so to speak, to Arkansas’ plan to expand health-care coverage to low-income residents through insurance exchanges as opposed to the Medicaid program.

Jones’ statement said, “Many states are looking to Arkansas to see what unfolds as they push for a system that would enroll those newly eligible for Medicaid into the same private insurance plans available to individuals and small businesses.”

That doesn’t mean Nixon is totally enamored with the proposal. In early March, he told reporters that he didn’t feel cutting children or pregnant women from the program were steps in the right direction.

“Do I have some issues with some portions of the bill? Yeah,” Nixon said last week. “But are we willing to work together? Absolutely. Will we work together to get reform? Yes. But the movement, the long hearing the House committee yesterday, the likelihood of that bill coming out of committee soon is a positive step for health care reform and Medicaid expansion.”

Jones went on to say at that many states are coming up with alternatives to Medicaid, adding “we’re going to have to come up with the Missouri solution.” That term — which was also used to describe a 2011 compromise on dog breeding legislation — was also brought up in Jones’ lengthy statement.

“As the president has seen more and more states refuse to accept federal dollars with all of the inflexible federal requirements, red tape and strings attached, we have seen a greater willingness to allow state governments the flexibility necessary to transform Medicaid as they see fit,” Jones’ statement said. “Our transformation plans will go nowhere unless the federal government agrees to let us develop the Missouri solution for Missouri’s Medicaid system,” he added.

Since Nixon announced his support for expanding Medicaid shortly after he was re-elected, the governor has spent the past few months traveling across the state to bolster his case on the issue.

His latest scheduled stop was Tuesday in Wentzville. Last week, he was at the Kirkwood Community Center to make his pitch.

Before he spoke, Nixon was introduced by St. Louis Regional Chamber President Joe Reagan – whose group is one of numerous chambers of commerce backing an expanded Medicaid. Just as he had before, Nixon said that expanding Medicaid would be an economic boon to the state by creating thousands of health-care jobs.

He also warned that failure to expand Medicaid could hurt the state’s hospitals since their reimbursement for uncompensated care is expected to go down in the next few years. That’s one reason the Missouri Hospital Association has come out strongly in favor of the proposal.

Above is part of Nixon’s speech in Kirkwood pushing for a Medicaid expansion.

The tail end of the governor’s speech included an emotional plea: Expanding Medicaid is morally right for people who are working at the lower-end of the pay scale.

“There are hundreds of thousands of working Missourians who don’t have one of those cards,” said Nixon, referring to a health insurance card. “And you know? I bet a bunch of them are doing really hard jobs. Like after this last snow, getting out there at night, making sure the streets are ready for the next day. Not just city workers, I’m sure they’re covered. Or the county workers. But you and I both know there are private folks out there that are working jobs for $9, $10 or $11 an hour with no insurance.

“And when they got home, maybe they broke an ankle or twisted something someplace,” he added. “And they have no health insurance card even though they work just as hard as anybody else in this room. Working Missourians. People making $9, $10, $11, $12 an hour on their way up. This provides them with the basic dignity and strength that health care and preventative health care can provide.”

Fair Energy Rate Action Fund, March 11, 2013

Businesses, just like politicians, need to be held accountable to the public when making public policy. Ameren, Empire and KCP&L’s recent explanation for why they need to abolish the PSC’s oversight of new expenditures and add a surcharge to the electric bill of every Missouri business and residential customer is a case in point.

The ISRS legislation was pitched to legislators as allowing electric companies to be able to collect a surcharge from customers to replace outdated and unreliable infrastructure, just like water and gas companies are able to do on a limited basis. If only it were true.

Unfortunately some extremely controversial and costly provisions were included in the legislation that are nothing like how water and gas companies are permitted to operate. This fact has left many legislators scratching their heads and hitting reverse.

These false claims include:

• Changing the definition of what an ISRS is all-together, unlike the more restrictive uses for water and gas companies. In fact it will cost customers an additional $14 million for every $100 million the utility spends through the ISRS. This additional $14 million per $100 million spent provides no benefit to customers other than opening up their pocketbook sooner and wider for the utility company.
• Slipping in an expensive cost overrun tracker that puts into law a disincentive for utilities to operate efficiently and keep their spending in check. The utilities can rack up overrun costs on this newly proposed ratepayer credit card. Had this provision been in effect over the past several years it would have cost Missourians an additional $200 million on top of the $5.7 BILLION in rate increases paid during this time. Missouri businesses and residents would have received the same exact service, but been forced to pay over $200 million more for absolutely nothing in return.
• Allowing the electric utilities to build brand new generation facilities through a new surcharge without going through the traditional ratemaking process that includes a prudency review and full revenue versus cost review by the Public Service Commission. The capital expenses allowed as part of this proposed surcharge are a monumental $3.4 BILLION over a three year period. To put this in perspective, under the electric ISRS, utility companies could spend more money than it cost to build Callaway I or Iatan II. By comparison, water companies can only spend $125 million every three years.
• Claiming that Ameren’s bond rating is so low it isn’t able to borrow money at the cheapest rates possible. The only problem with this talking point is that Ameren Missouri, funded by Missouri customers only, is one of the healthiest utility companies in the country with an A3 bond rating, which is a strong investment grade according to Moody’s. Ameren’s corporate bond rating is poor because its other two units, Ameren Illinois and Ameren Generating Company, have experienced huge losses in the open market lately. It frankly should not be the Missouri legislature’s job to bail out the poor business practices of Ameren Illinois and Ameren Generating Company.
• Utilities have argued that this won’t lead to higher electric bills for Missouri families and businesses. By its very definition a surcharge adds costs to consumers. That’s why in a recent poll by Public Opinion Strategies, 71% of Missourians opposed this legislation, with 77% of Missourians less likely to support a candidate for office in Missouri that favored this legislation.

Proponents of this legislation also continue to talk about the jobs that would be created, even though the opposite is actually true. A study released last week, by a firm that has done work recently for Ameren, showed if electric rates were increased by 10%, as the electric ISRS allows, Missouri would lose 60,000 jobs. All of the hard work that has been done in recent years by legislators to make Missouri a more business friendly state might as well be thrown out the window if this legislation passes.

The first question these utility companies need to answer is why they proposed legislation that says one thing but they claim does another. These monopolies need to be accountable and prove they can be trusted with more of Missourians’ hard earned money.

Missouri Times, March 26, 2013

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – A contentious Public Service Commission meeting ended in consensus on Wednesday with the PSC voting unanimously to allow the expedited request of Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Glendale, to provide the Senate more information on the pending “ISRS” legislation in the form of a formal docket and have the information returned to Senator Schmitt as soon as possible.

Schmitt was pleased by this affirmation by the commission’s decision to review the legislation that would allow investor owned utilities to charge customers a surcharge in order to pay for previously completed infrastructure projects.

“I am pleased the PSC has kept the docket open and will allow a full review of the facts, SB207 and its impact on our constituents,” Schmitt said. “Allowing this process to move forward will aid in general assembly’s deliberation on this very important matter.”

While supporting keeping the docket open, the PSC did amend their prior plans for a full inquiry that would include a hearing and a discovery phase. Their decision came after Senate President Pro Tem Tom Dempsey and Sen. Brad Lager, chairman of the Commerce, Consumer Protection, Energy and the Environment Committee, penned a letter urging them to cancel the hearing.

Dempsey told The Missouri Times that he was fine with receiving technical advice from the PSC on a bill.  But, the decision to hold a hearing under Section 386.380.2 RSMo should be discussed by the whole Senate or House, or perhaps requested by the President Pro Tem or Speaker of the House acting in their capacity as presiding officers of their respective chambers.

Lager also expressed support for the way in which the PSC handled the matter.

“I think they did a wise thing by canceling the hearing. They should respond to senators questions, and I comfortable with how they handled the situation,” he said.

In a previous scenario, Lager and Dempsey sent a letter asking for the PSC to increase their involvement in a utility matter. However, Lager pointed out that the circumstances were very different from then and now.

“The previous letter I sent to the PSC was meant to ask for technical information and was to be provided while the legislature was not in session,” he said.

The PSC reached consensus on allowing the docket to remain open after nearly an hour of contentious debate. Chairman Robert Kenney aggressively advocated for a full, open docket that would include a hearing and a discovery phase. Commissioner Terry Jarrett led the fight for as narrow an inquiry as possible while repeatedly saying he was for transparency, just not for a larger inquiry on this issue.

Commissioner Terry Jarrett argued that opening this docket had brought the PSC into the ISRS debate, which was met by a lengthy rebuttal by Chairman Kenney, who carefully referenced many past instances where the PSC had already been involved in the ISRS issue.

“The public docket would just be a framework for the PSC to do what we were already doing only on the record and in public instead of the way we were doing it,” Kenney said.

Commissioner Bill Kenney suggested that the request for further PSC involvement was a strategic move by opponents of the ISRS legislation to use the PSC as a pawn to delay debate and make passage less likely.

Lager said he agreed with Kenney’s view: “I believe invoking the PSC here was meant as a stalling tactic, and I believe it was very effective. I would speculate at this point the ISRS legislation has less than a 25 percent chance of passing.”

However, Schmitt specifically requested an expedited request, and The Missouri Times has confirmed a letter was signed by five Senators — Dan Brown, Doug Libla, Wayne Wallingford, Mike Parson, and Gary Romine — asking Dempsey to wait to begin debate on SB207 until the PSC has issued their expedited reply to Schmitt.

Jarrett argued several times after it was clear Schmitt’s request for more input would be granted to send that reply as soon as possible.

“I want to see it sent as soon after comments close on April 1as possible,” he said. With the legislature on break for Easter, the earliest the PSC response is likely to arrive when the Senate is in session would be on April 8.

While Lager may be pessimistic about the chances of passing the legislation, the war between both sides raged on. After the PSC meeting, Irl L. Scissors, executive director of Missourians for a Balanced Energy Future, sent out a statement.

“Throughout the legislative process, MBEF has worked with lawmakers from across the political spectrum and from every corner of the state, as well as with the Executive branch,” he said. “We will continue to provide information and answer questions about this important legislation that will keep moving Missouri forward by modernizing regulations, enabling investment in infrastructure and creating thousands of jobs in Missouri.”

Chris Roepe, a spokesman for the Fair Energy Rate Action Fund, responded: “The fact that Missouri utility companies continue to refuse to provide information and oppose a full investigation, public hearing and full exposure of this new surcharge legislation should tell Missourians all they need to know about what this new law will do to their electric bill.”