Missouri General Assembly convenes 2002 session

Associated Press Writer

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) -- The Missouri Legislature starts its 2002 session Wednesday with money matters on the minds of many lawmakers.

Faced with a tight state budget, legislators will be looking for ways to cut costs yet still expand spending for education, health care and new security steps taken after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Then, too, there are proposals to provide state tax incentives for economic development -- sports stadiums included -- and to ask voters to raise taxes for transportation.

Add the advent of term limits, combined new legislative districts and an election year, and the stage is set for an usual session.

"Now is our moment of truth," House Speaker Jim Kreider said in remarks prepared for the noon start of the session.

Kreider, D-Nixa, foresees nearly $1 billion in cuts to state services in order to balance the budgets for this year and next.

The House is doing its part, he said, by cutting $2 million from its own $21 million budget, trimming travel, streamlining operations and eliminating some senior-level jobs.

The money saved, Kreider said, should be redirected to education.

The Senate, which also has cut costs and some staff, was convening in a newly renovated chamber. The literal top-to-bottom remodeling was for the first for the Senate in 80 years and cost $1.9 million -- an expense that was approved before the current budget problems and which many senators said was well worth it.

"The historic chamber, featuring these magnificent columns with their echoes of our Greco-Roman heritage, was before the most recent renovation already one of the grand legislative chambers in the world," Senate President Pro Tem Peter Kinder, R-Cape Girardeau, said in prepared remarks. "Now it takes its place as incontestably among the most beautiful."

The 2002 session will be the last before term limits force about 75 House members and a dozen senators out of their seats.

Some will be retiring, but many House members will be looking to run for the Senate. That could be complicated because legislative redistricting has changed the boundaries for the 2002 elections. Consequently, some representatives trying to move to the Senate will be running against each other.

How those political changes will affect policy decisions remains to be seen. No other state has experienced legislative term limits and redistricting in the same year.

Gov. Bob Holden is hoping the large class of lame-duck lawmakers will feel compelled to leave a legacy -- to work together to pass legislation they could not agree upon in the past.

"Out of these times of challenges come great opportunities," Holden said. "This session can truly be a positive one."

Besides the budget, Holden is focusing on education -- fully funding the requested increase in the basic formula for public schools and passing new accountability standards for poor-performing schools.

The accountability program isn't intended to need new state money, Holden said. But it could cost money for teachers and administrators in schools targeted because of their troubles. The proposal would require them to pass tests or take classes in order to receive pay raises.

Holden's education plan has not yet been put in bill form. Nor has his budget proposal, which is to be delivered Jan. 23 in an address to the Legislature.

The session runs through May. 17.

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