Public outcry results in big talk, no action

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- A few months ago, Missouri residents were upset and demanding change on problems ranging from losing electricity to a failing school system to being bothered during dinner by political calls.

When the year began, legislative leaders and Gov. Matt Blunt also expressed outrage and promised they would make changes this year.

When the legislative session concluded Friday, none of that rhetoric translated into results.

What happened?

"Special interest has more power at times than citizens' needs," groused Sen. Tim Green, D-St. Louis.

Power outages

A wave of storms in the summer and again after Thanksgiving and in January knocked out light and heat to hundreds of thousands, some for a week or more. St. Louis and southwest Missouri were especially hard hit.

"Missourians who have had to endure multiple outages deserve real answers and effective solutions," Blunt said in his State of the State speech in January.

Green pushed for legislation directing state utility regulators to adopt standards Ameren Corp. and other investor-owned companies must meet for tree-trimming and to penalize those that came up short.

His bill failed, but the Public Service Commission said it understands the concerns and is already working on rules for tree-trimming, power reliability and inspecting infrastructure.

Others proposed even stronger legislation, calling for customers to get credits when the power goes out for at least a day and to require electric companies' profits to drop if they don't meet certain standards in keeping the lights on. Those bills failed, too.

Richard Fulton, a political science professor at Northwest Missouri State University, said it's tough for public outcry to withstand powerful lobbyists, and that solving such problems isn't as simple as onlookers think.

"You get public outrage and unless that can be sustained somewhere, the interest groups quietly talk to the legislators and governor, the complexity of the problem spreads out and nothing happens," he said.

St. Louis schools

Political leaders also pledged to change laws to improve the St. Louis School District, the state's largest, which has struggled academically and financially for years.

"We are allowing the St. Louis City public schools, which serve a large and very vulnerable population of students, to drive the final nail into the coffins of their futures," Senate President Pro Tem Michael Gibbons, a Kirkwood Republican, said in opening remarks in January. "The students in failing districts need us to act now. Their lives and futures depend on us."

The State Board of Education stripped the St. Louis district of accreditation in March and an appointed board will start running the schools in June. Blunt seemed satisfied with that.

Automated calls

A third issue that generated public attention and outcry was automated phone calls, generally from prominent figures such as former president Bill Clinton urging support for a candidate.

Consumers tired of being bothered flooded the attorney general's office with more than 600 complaints leading up to last November's elections.

Legislation to expand the state's do-not-call list to limit such automated calls and to cover cell phones and fax numbers cleared the Senate but was never debated in the House.

"Because the attorney general is in charge of the no-call list, we think we're going to give him a victory, so we won't take it up," sponsoring Sen. Kevin Engler, R-Farmington said sarcastically.

Attorney General Jay Nixon, a Democrat, is the likely challenger to Republican Gov. Matt Blunt in 2008. The legislature is controlled by Republicans.

"Because of their inaction ... Missouri families will continue to be bombarded by annoying political robo-calls," Nixon said in a written statement.

It's not unusual for major initiatives to take more than a year to get accomplished.

After the Ameren-owned Taum Sauk reservoir breached in December 2005, inundating a state park with 1 billion gallons of water and injuring a family, bills to increase dam inspections were proposed. But they have failed two years in a row.

Sometimes tragic events do spur change. Last November, a southwest Missouri group home for the mentally ill and disabled burned, causing 11 deaths.

Blunt ordered a review of Missouri's fire safety regulations and quickly endorsed a recommendation that long-term care facilities install sprinklers.

A phased-in requirement that most such homes install sprinklers and fire alarms appeared in trouble but won final legislative approval a day before the session ended.

Fulton said it's in politicians' interest to act after such a tragedy.

"All you need is one more in which people die and the legislators really get it then," he said. "To protect themselves politically, they really do need to do something because that's people's lives."