Committee votes to open inquiry into Holden administration

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- A legislative committee voted Wednesday to open an inquiry into whether the executive branch has directed state employees to limit their responses to lawmakers seeking information.

The broadly described inquiry grew out of Republican lawmakers' concerns that department directors in Democratic Gov. Bob Holden's administration have been stonewalling legislative efforts to cut the state's operating budget.

The Republican-dominated Joint Committee on Legislative Research voted 11-7 along party lines to take testimony from state officials about the issue.

House Democratic Leader Mark Abel of Festus called the inquiry "silly" and "ridiculous."

In addressing an estimated $1 billion shortfall in the next budget, some House Republicans have asked department directors to recommend where their agencies' funding could be cut even deeper than Holden has suggested.

Republicans' suspicions that departments were being uncooperative rose last week, when notes taken by a Department of Natural Resources employee at a Feb. 20 staff meeting were given to a GOP lawmaker.

In the notes, DNR employee Scott Patterson wrote: "Warning: If a senator or representative asks you for ideas about how to reduce the department's budget, Do not do this. This is a firing offense."

Patterson, in an interview, has said the notes accurately reflected his impression of comments made by a DNR administrator, Gary Heimericks.

But Heimericks and DNR director Steve Mahfood have said Patterson misunderstood the comments, which they say were intended only to stress that additional budget cuts could mean employee layoffs.

'Dangerous territory'

Sen. Harold Caskey, D-Butler, suggested lawmakers may be exceeding their authority by interrogating executive branch employees about what was said at their meetings.

"You're in dangerous territory," Caskey told Republicans. "I don't think we've thought it out as clearly as we need to."

Republicans have pointed to a Missouri law that states that agency supervisors shall not prohibit employees from "discussing the operations of the agency, either specifically or generally, with any member of the legislature."

The Joint Committee on Legislative Research, which consists of both House and Senate members, also approved a list Wednesday of about 225 projects to be funded by the issuance of $400 million in revenue bonds.

The projects include everything from a pair of $30 million buildings for the University of Missouri system to a $158 repair on the heating, air conditioning and ventilation system in a state building.

All of the construction and repair projects already were scheduled to be done. Funding the projects through bonds would free up money to be put toward the state's budget shortfall -- projected at $400 million this year and as much as $1 billion next fiscal year.

Legislators passed a bill last month authorizing the revenue bonds. But several more legislative and administrative steps must occur before the bonds can be issued.