A petition drive to let voters decide whether to extend a sales tax for state parks and conservation programs is going well, says an official with Missouri Farm Bureau.
The effort was launched by Farm Bureau and a number of conservation and parks groups in August at the Missouri State Fair. The first batch of signatures was turned in Dec. 1.
Although signatures have not yet been completely tallied, Estil Fretwell, a Farm Bureau official involved with the effort, said preliminary estimates look encouraging.
The drive is aimed at putting a proposed extension of a one-tenth-cent sales tax before voters. Proceeds from the tax are divided evenly between the state parks system and soil and water conservation programs.
The tax, which already has been extended once, is due to expire Nov. 8, 1998. Last spring the General Assembly attempted to put the issue on the ballot for 1996 but failed after urban interests tried to obtain a cut of the tax for urban parks and storm-water projects.
"We're resigned to the fact that if we can't go through the legislature, we'll have to go back to the pavement," Fretwell said. Farm Bureau led a similar petition effort to extend the tax in 1988.
The petition calls for extending the tax 10 years, until 2008.
To get the issue on the ballot, organizers must collect 125,000 signatures in six of the state's nine congressional districts and submit them to the secretary of state's office by July 5, 1996. The goal is 180,000 signatures in each district.
Petition coordinators are pushing the drive in every county, each of which has specific number goals to reach. Looking at the first batch, some counties may already be on the fast track.
"I'm confident that when the petitions are tallied, some counties will already have met their goal," Fretwell said.
Steve Huber, coordinator for Perry County, said between 400 and 500 signatures have been collected. That puts the Perry County effort over halfway to its goal of 800 signatures, though Huber hopes to top 1,000.
Stanley Murray, coordinator for Bollinger County, said the petition effort there is just getting under way. As a Farm Bureau board member and a former member of his local soil and water district, Murray has seen the benefits of the tax first hand.
A number of programs funded by the tax, including the Special Area Land Treatment project on Malone Creek near Leopold, are helping to reduce erosion and soil runoff in the region.
"We're trying to protect soil as a natural resource and improve water quality," he said.
Another benefit of the tax, said Murray, is it provides funds that help farmers pay interest on loans to purchase machinery for no-till farming.
"This helped to get a lot of reduced-till equipment throughout the state," Murray said. "It is not a complete freebie; landowners have to put a lot of their own money and effort into it."
Perry County benefits from about $150,000 in funds from the tax for soil and water conservation purposes, said Huber, who represents Southeast Missouri on the Missouri Association of Soil and Water Districts. Without the tax, many of those conservation projects would not be funded.
Also, tax money has been used to upgrade facilities and improve maintenance at state parks.
Missouri voters initially approved the tax in 1984. The tax was to expire after five years.
As would happen again in 1995, the legislature tried in 1988 to put a 10-year extension on the ballot, but gave up when other groups sought part of the funding. Seventy percent of voters approved the measure when it ended up on the ballot via initiative petition.
At the time the tax was first approved, Missouri had the second-worst soil erosion problem in the nation. The state has since dropped to seventh.
"The tax has done a lot of good," Murray said. "I'd like to see it continued."
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