SPECIAL SESSION FOR ROADS HAS NO STEAM

Republican lawmakers are overwhelmingly turning thumbs down on Gov. Mel Carnahan's idea of a special session to send to the people a one-cent general sales tax to finance transportation improvements. The Total Transportation Commission, whose members were appointed by the governor, adopted the proposal 27-3. Meeting at their annual summer caucus in Branson last weekend, 54 House Republicans voted for a resolution disapproving the idea. The House GOP action followed by two days a Senate Republican caucus (15 members) at which no support for the idea was heard.

These parleys followed meetings with Democratic lawmakers the week before in which unanswered questions decisively outnumbered supporters. Democratic leaders of both the House and Senate are gently advising the governor that, to this point at least, support for the idea doesn't exist. The first torchlight parade of Missourians circling the Capitol demanding higher taxes has yet to be sighted.

House GOP leader Delbert Scott of Lowry City is forthright, pointing to the fact that lawmakers are being asked to sign onto the proposal before having even been supplied the TTC's final report. "The notion of calling a special session to ask taxpayers for another tax increase before all the facts are in is completely irresponsible," said Scott. Noting there is no "immediate crisis," Scott added, "The governor's `tax first, ask questions later' approach is not good governance, and we will not support a `hurry up and shoved through fast' tax just so he can get a large tax increase on the ballot where a few voters will decide the fate for all Missourians."

Beyond this, the TTC proposes to move Missouri beyond the long-established practice of fuel taxes for financing roads and bridges, to the addition of a general sales tax for this purpose. It isn't at all clear that this has been thought through in the thorough fashion demanded by so major a departure from tradition.

The power to call a special session and specify the subject(s) to be addressed lies exclusively with the chief executive. Your move, governor.