THOMASON COMMITTEE TO ESTABLISH FISCAL NOTE FOR BALLOT ISSUES

KENNETT -- As acting chairman of the Joint Legislative Research Committee, State Rep. Larry Thomason was scrambling Friday to get a meeting called after two constitutional amendments were ordered on the ballot.

On Thursday, Secretary of State Judith Moriarty ruled that enough valid petitions had been turned in to hold statewide votes Nov. 8 on the Hancock II amendment and one that would legalize slot machines on gambling boats.

Thomason's committee is responsible for drafting ballot language and fiscal notes for amendments. But legislators faces strict time guidelines for having the work done.

Since the ballot wording was determined by organizers of the petition drives, the joint committee must decide fiscal notes and come up with about three dozen words for the ballot to describe that fiscal impact.

"There will be reams of paper on what the actual fiscal note is, but what we have to do is boil it down to the one or two lines people will actually read," said the Kennett Democrat.

Thomason said legislative research staff had done some work already on the issues, but didn't expect a meeting until the annual veto session on Sept. 14. Since the issues were certified sooner than expected, a committee meeting is needed next week.

Thomason has called a meeting for 1 p.m. Tuesday in Jefferson City.

"Our people won't have much of a weekend because they will be getting all this ready," said Thomason, who expects the Hancock II fiscal note determination to be draw criticism.

The riverboat gambling fiscal note will show how much revenue the state would likely receive if slot machines are legalized.

But the note on Hancock II will show a huge negative impact on the state's financial position, Thomason predicted.

"We will have real difficulty doing a fiscal note on it. It is so poorly written that no one really fully understands what it does. The consensus at this point seems to be that it does force a refund of taxes we have already collected, and also that it would basically mandate a rollback of taxes the state collects back to around a 1981 level," said Thomason.

The committee's staff will have several summaries prepared to review, but he anticipates a likely conclusion will be that Hancock II will require a $1.7 billion cut in the state's $5.2 billion general revenue funding, which he said will devastate essential state functions.

Missouri's total budget is $12.2 billion, but it includes funds from all sources including federal monies. But Thomason said that with the cuts in general revenue money there will be less federal money coming in because state funds won't be available to match it.

Some projections show the actual reduction in funds available to the state under Hancock II would be $3-5 billion.

"I don't think too many people have really thought about what this will do to the state," said Thomason. "From what I can tell, it will make us a third world country."