House panel OKs cutting $12M for St. Louis football stadium

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- A panel of Missouri lawmakers on Monday moved to cut a $12 million state payment for the Edward Jones Dome, which the St. Louis Rams are vacating for a move to California.

The House committee chopped next fiscal year's annual payment, which would help pay off the football stadium.

Gov. Jay Nixon last year proposed extending payments to build a new stadium in an effort to keep the Rams in St. Louis.

Those plans fell apart when NFL owners in January voted to allow the team to move to the Los Angeles area, but not before an onslaught of criticism from some lawmakers upset about the prospects of taking on debt without legislative or voter approval.

House General Administration Appropriations Committee chairman Rep. Robert Ross, a Republican from Yukon, said Monday that Nixon had taken "unilateral action" to use state money "at his own whim."

"That's wrong," Ross said. "Part of what you're seeing today is a rebuke on that practice."

Some lawmakers are frustrated because they want a record related to Nixon's stadium plans, which an Office of Administration spokeswoman said is confidential because of attorney-client privilege.

Nixon's administration has raised concerns stopping payments for the stadium could hurt the state's credit rating, which Ross and other lawmakers dispute.

"Fiscal discipline means paying your bills, and this is very early in the budget process," Nixon spokeswoman Channing Ansley said. "That's why the governor is confident that the General Assembly, as it has done each and every year since the agreement was entered into by Governor (John) Ashcroft's administration, will continue to fulfill this financial obligation and help preserve Missouri's AAA credit rating."

The spending cut is up for review in another House committee and needs approval from the full House before it can move to the Senate.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Kehoe said it's too early to say how such a cut might fare in the Senate.

But he said his colleagues want to make a point that taxpayers or elected officials should be informed before the state takes on additional debt.