KINDER'S COMMENTARY: NEAR SESSION'S MIDPOINT, THERE'S STILL PLENTY TO DO

Two more weeks and we'll be at the midpoint of the 1997 regular session of the 89th General Assembly, heading toward a May 16 adjournment. How time races by. Herewith, by way of an update, a few comments on the action that has -- or hasn't -- unfolded since Jan. 8.

A ridiculous amount of precious time was spent at the beginning on the oversized pay raises contained in a newly formed pay commission's recommendations. Both House and Senate overwhelmingly rejected them, and somehow neither has one judge resigned, nor has the sky fallen. Modest cost-of-living raises will be in order through the routine business of the state budget. We should repeal this constitutional amendment lest we be put through this needless exercise every two years.

Big issues remaining for resolution this session include tax cuts and school funding issues. First, tax cuts. The state has exceeded the revenue lids contained in the Hancock Amendment for the first time since its 1980 adoption. Accordingly, we owe taxpayers a refund of well over $200 million. Gov. Carnahan has endorsed a proposal championed for three straight years by House Republicans to eliminate the three-cent state sales tax on food. This week the House unanimously passed it, acting to cut your taxes by $230 million.

That bill now comes to the Senate, where a fascinating scenario may unfold. The House passed a "clean" bill, meaning no amendments. Amendments abound in the Senate: to triple the tax deduction for dependents from $400 to $1,200; to provide tax credits for tuition to private and parochial schools; to equalize the tax treatment of private and [public pensioners, among others.

A major school funding bill is under consideration by the Senate Education Committee and will likely be voted on at our meeting this week. Senate Bill 360 is the result of a lot of groping around by civic and business leaders in St. Louis and Kansas City, home to the two most expensive desegregation cases ($3 billion or so) in America. Led by former U.S. Sen. John Danforth, these leaders confront the impending end, in one fashion or another, of the state's obligation to continue funding these urban deseg cases. The keystone of this measure is to replace funding for schools by race, as in deseg, with funding by poverty-stricken youngsters, defined as the number in the free-and-reduced lunch program.

Many of us who would rather that this funding flow unimpeded into the state's foundation formula for distribution to all school districts nonetheless judge that one way or another, we'll all end up paying for city schools.

To sweeten the bitter money pill, Danforth and other SB 360 backers are including in it a leading version of charter schools, described in two columns in this space last month. This contains the real promise of a lot more education reform than we have seen in Missouri to date. It will be up to yours truly and like-minded lawmakers to drive the hardest bargain we can, and to kill SB 360 if we don't get the pathbreaking reforms that now seem within reach.

~Peter Kinder is assistant to the president of Rust Communications and a state senator from Cape Girardeau.