Senate leader 'flat-out forgot' Southeast in bill

~ The $17.2 million for the River Campus arts school was back in the spending plan on Friday.

The chairman of the Missouri Senate Appropriations Committee says he simply forgot to include the River Campus project in a list of college construction projects that he proposed to fund with money from the sale of student loans.

"I put the bill together. I screwed up and didn't put it in," said state Sen. Chuck Gross, R-St. Charles. "I just flat-out forgot."

Sen. Jason Crowell, R-Cape Girardeau, phoned Gross Thursday night to point out the problem only hours after Gross had introduced a bill to spend nearly $450 million in projected income from the sale of Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority loans.

By Friday afternoon, Gross said he had already rewritten his bill to include $17.2 million in funding for Southeast Missouri State University's River Campus arts school in the spending plan.

To make room in the spending plan for the River Campus, Gross intends to reduce proposed spending for some of the health-care items in the bill. The measure includes money for health centers that serve mainly Medicare and Medicaid patients, as well as scholarships for medical, nursing and dental students.

Adding the River Campus project won't cut into the proposed funding for any of the other college construction projects, Gross said.

"There are places outside of the capital section that we can pull different money from to get to $17.2 million," he said Friday.

The bill was introduced Thursday afternoon after many lawmakers already had left the Capitol to return home for the weekend.

Senate President Pro Tem Michael Gibbons, R-Kirkwood, apologized for the last-minute introduction of the spending plan.

In a memorandum to Republican senators on Friday, Gibbons said it took longer than expected to craft the spending plan.

Senate leaders, he wrote, wanted to make sure that the spending plan included "pro-life language."

The bill prohibits the use of any the funding to construct and equip buildings and laboratories that would be used for human cloning, abortions or genetic testing of fetuses that could result in abortions.

Gibbons wrote in the memo that the River Campus project should have been included in the bill from the start.

Senate leaders wanted to get the bill filed so the appropriations committee could hold a hearing on it next week, Gibbons wrote.

The committee is scheduled to hear the bill on Tuesday.

In addition to money for the River Campus, the spending plan includes $5 million the governor had recommended to help construct a life-science laboratory at Southeast Missouri State University's planned research park near Interstate 55.

Sen. Gary Nodler, R-Joplin, said the Senate bill is designed to provide another option for the legislature to consider in deciding how the state should spend the anticipated proceeds from the sale of student loans.

Appropriations bills traditionally start in the House. But the Senate decided to unveil its own spending plan so it wouldn't be locked into the House plan, said Nodler, who serves as vice chairman of the appropriations committee.

The Senate plan includes some $300 million in campus construction projects favored by the governor.

The House plan includes $165 million for campus construction, although the list of projects hasn't been finalized.

The legislature likely will end up with a compromise measure that includes provisions from the House, Senate and governor's plans, Nodler said.

But settling on a spending plan could be difficult, said state Sen. Chuck Purgason, R-Caulfield, Mo., who also serves on the appropriations committee.

Purgason doesn't want to rush it. "I really don't feel comfortable doing any of the MOHELA money right now," he said.

The loans haven't been sold yet. Any money from such sales wouldn't be available until late this year, he said.

"I would like to have the money in the bank before we start spending it," he said.

mbliss@semissourian.com

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