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Missouri Independent: Missouri Senate debate over state holidays devolves into shouting match3/7/2024
Missouri Senate debate over state holidays devolves into shouting matchby Ezra Bitterman, Missouri Independent The Missouri Senate became a convoluted mess Tuesday as a debate over ceremonial holidays quickly turned into an argument on transgender healthcare. State Sen. Greg Razer, a Kansas City Demcorat, introduced a bill creating “Chris Sifford Day.” Sifford was a longtime staffer for former Missouri Gov. Mel Carnahan, a Democrat, before both died in a plane crash. Numerous amendments were attached to the bill by other senators, adding other ceremonial holidays. Few senators were even present for the lengthy debate over what holidays to add and whether Missouri’s unofficial moniker “the Show-Me State” needs to be enshrined in law. State Sen. Lincoln Hough, a Springfield Republican, even watched some of the proceedings in the gallery among the public. State Sen. Denny Hoskins, a Republican from Warrensburg, criticized the number of commemorative holidays the state has. There are over 100 ceremonial holidays in state law. Most of these are unknown to all but a few people, such as Jan. 16, which is set as Albert Pujols Day to honor the St. Louis Cardinal legend. Hoskins offered an amendment that would to add an expiration date to the holidays included in Razer’s bill. That amendment reopened debate from last year, when a bill blocking doctors from administering gender-affirming care to minors was only able to get through a Democrat filibuster when a 2027 expiration date was added. Hoskins has filed a bill this year that would remove that expiration date. Razer, the Senate’s only openly gay member, opposed the amendment, saying he felt that Hoskins can’t, in good conscience, propose the expiration of a holiday when he can’t keep a promise on the deal made last year. Hoskins retorted that he never agreed not to file a law removing the expiration date on the transgender legislation at some point in the future. After continuing back and forth, the debate reached a climax when Hoskins said: “We want to talk little kids having their private parts cut off?” in a reference to medical procedures for gender transition. Razer responded: “How many times did you say that ridiculous lie last year?” Then, after screaming at each other for a few seconds, Senate President Pro Tem Caleb Rowden banged his gavel and called the chamber to order. The bill was set aside, ending what was meant to be a procedural debate on ceremonial holidays that became a fiery referendum on gender policy. This story originally appeared in the Columbia Missourian. It can be republished in print or online. Missouri Independent is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Missouri Independent maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jason Hancock for questions: info@missouriindependent.com. Follow Missouri Independent on Facebook and Twitter. First contract for widening I-70 approved by Missouri highways commissionby Rudi Keller, Missouri Independent The first contract for reconstruction of Interstate 70, for a 20-mile stretch from Columbia to Kingdom City, was awarded Wednesday by the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission. The $405 million contract is part of a planned $2.8 billion project that will add a lane of traffic in both directions from Wentzville in St. Charles County to Blue Springs in Jackson County. The work awarded Wednesday to Millstone Weber for construction and Jacobs for engineering is expected to be finished by the end of 2027. The entire I-70 project is expected to be completed by the end of 2030. The next sections to be contracted will be from Blue Springs to Odessa in western Missouri and from Wentzville to Warrenton on the eastern side of the state. At a news conference after the commission vote, Missouri Department of Transportation officials and the contractors said there will be two lanes open for traffic in both directions across the state throughout the project, which should minimize delays for motorists. “We promise we are not going to do anything to make people’s lives miserable,” said Thom Kuhn, president of Millstone Weber. Lawmakers last year appropriated $2.8 billion, half from surplus general revenue and half from bonds to be issued as needed, for the biggest interstate construction program since the highways were first built in the 1950s and early 1960s. Widening and rebuilding I-70, the first interstate highway to be built in the nation, has been on MoDOT’s unfunded agenda for almost 20 years. “We’ve been studying this corridor for decades,” MoDOT Director Patrick McKenna said. The section from U.S. Highway 63 in Columbia to U.S. Highway 54 at Kingdom City was chosen because other work has already been planned to rebuild both intersections. “That section really made sense for us to get a quick start and begin construction later this spring or early summer,” said Eric Kopinski, director of the Improve I-70 Program. “Had we looked at a larger section or incorporated a larger contract, our start would have been much delayed.” The Columbia intersection of Highway 63 and I-70 is notorious for congestion, and the reconstruction plan anticipates redirecting as much of 60% of local traffic away from the rebuilt interchange. There will be four roundabouts, a new bridge and a new collector road, project director Jeff Gander said. “I know some of you may not understand a lot of that terminology, but it’s really cool and it’s going to work really really well because it’s going to be like nothing you’ve ever seen, but it is going to function very well,” he said. The appropriation to rebuild I-70 is one side of a tumultuous relationship between lawmakers and MoDOT. Over the past several years, the legislature has approved an increased fuel tax to fund road work and delivered large general revenue appropriations for work that is outside the 5-year Statewide Transportation Improvement Plan, or STIP, to maintain low-volume rural roads. The difficult side of the relationship includes efforts to put MoDOT under more direct control of the General Assembly or governor. The biggest point of conflict between lawmakers and MoDOT is over a lawsuit filed by the commission seeking clarity about its authority to spend Road Fund money as it sees fit. The commission wants to implement a market-based pay plan to raise salaries so 65% of MoDOT employees are at or above the midpoint in the pay range for their job. In the fiscal year that ended June 30, 89.4% were below the midpoint, according to state budget documents. On Oct. 31,Cole County Circuit Judge Cotton Walker ruled that a provision in the Missouri Constitution that states money deposited in the fund shall “stand appropriated without legislative action” gives the commission the authority to implement the pay plan. Walker’s ruling is being appealed and the pay plan, first authorized in 2021, remains on hold. Legislation introduced this year includes a proposal to repeal the “stand appropriated” language and limit MoDOT spending to amounts approved by the legislature. Other proposals would give lawmakers power to veto the STIP and eliminate the commission and allow the governor to appoint the department director. During the commission meeting, member W. Dustin Boatwright of Cape Girardeau warned that passage of any of the bills would mean major disruptions to department operations. “These proposed changes could result in upheaval of the project selection process by shifting funds from one area of the state to another without public input and allowing partisan politics to enter a nonpartisan commission structure,” Boatwright said. At the news conference after the meeting, Commission Chairman Terry Ecker of Elmo said he is confident that none of the proposals will win passage. “I’m just gonna say it’s not gonna happen,” Ecker said. The present structure isolates the commission from politics and any changes would have to be approved by voters, he noted. “And I just don’t foresee that happening,” Ecker said. “So I don’t know that we spend much time worrying about it.” Another issue that has some lawmakers questioning how road funds are used involves the money for the I-70 project. The $1.4 billion set aside from general revenue has earned $16.4 million in interest so far this fiscal year, money Gov. Mike Parson wants to earmark for a study of which portions of Interstate 44 should be improved. During a budget hearing, lawmakers questioned Treasurer Vivek Malek on how interest earned on the fund is being credited in state accounts. They contend the interest earnings should be returned to the general revenue fund instead of remaining in the earmarked account. The project awarded Wednesday is a design-build contract that specifies any risk of cost overruns will be borne by the contractors. “When we talk about risk,” McKenna said, “this is a risk that’s being factored in by the industry.” Missouri Independent is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Missouri Independent maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jason Hancock for questions: info@missouriindependent.com. Follow Missouri Independent on Facebook and Twitter. Missouri lawmakers want to raise teacher pay but anticipate Senate resistanceby Annelise Hanshaw, Missouri Independent Legislation boosting teacher recruitment and retention in Missouri is once again a priority of the Missouri House, with a hearing Wednesday morning on a pair of Republican-backed bills. Rep. Ed Lewis, a Republican from Moberly, is sponsoring legislation based on the findings of the State Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s blue ribbon commission. It is the third year he has sponsored legislation on teacher recruitment and retention. “The problem is obvious to all of us at this point,” he told the committee. “We don’t have enough teachers for our public schools and, to some extent, for the private and parochial schools as well.” After three years in a Missouri school district, an average 43.3% of teachers leave, according to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. According to the Missouri National Education Association, a teachers’ union, the state ranks 50th in average starting teacher pay and 47th in average teacher pay. Lewis’s bill seeks to raise the base teacher pay, allow differentiated salary schedules for hard-to-staff areas and increase scholarships to recruit teachers, among other provisions.
Rep. Ann Kelley, a Republican from Lamar, asked whether support staff could be added to the bill. “The schools cannot be successful without the support staff, and the salaries of the support staff and retention and retaining those support staff is vital,” Kelley said. Lewis was hesitant to increase the potential fiscal impact. “We’re gonna have a hard time getting anything across the finish line on the other side,” he said, referring to the Senate. Last year, he filed the teacher pay-raise proposals as separate bills before the committee combined them into one bill. The House overwhelmingly approved the legislation on a 145-5 vote, but filibusters in the Senate ran out the clock before it could be debated in that chamber. Rep. Willard Haley, a Republican from Eldon, is also sponsoring a bill to raise teachers’ minimum salary — though his ask is a bit different. He hopes to raise the base to $46,000 by the 2027-28 school year. Fully implemented, the bill is estimated to cost up to $17.5 million. “I just insist that it’s time that we start paying our teachers what they deserve,” Haley said. He said teenagers with a high-school diploma can make more working at a local factory than some teachers do. Currently, state statute allows schools to pay teachers as little as $25,000 or $33,000 for those with a master’s degree and 10 years of experience. The state has a grant program, which is up for renewal annually, to raise teacher base salaries to $38,000. In the current school year, 310 school districts are using the grant for a total of 4,806 teachers, the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education told The Independent. Gov. Mike Parson has requested an increase to this program to raise the base to $40,000 for the next fiscal year. Lewis doesn’t like relying on the annual appropriations for teacher salaries. He said he worries, with an upcoming gubernatorial election, the next governor may not fully fund the base-salary grant. “I don’t think we should legislate through the budget. I think that the policy should go first and the budget should follow,” he told the committee. Haley’s bill prescribes a fund that would match district’s contributions 70/30 to get salaries to his preferred base. Rep. Kathy Steinhoff, a Columbia Democrat, said she wanted a “broader” change. “I look at our large school districts… 52% of our districts will see no impact from state dollars towards teacher salaries,” she said. “I feel pretty confident if we ask those districts ‘Are you having a retention problem?’ They would probably all say yes.” Rep. Dan Stacy, a Republican from Blue Springs, asked if a base-pay increase could be tied to a decrease to another part of the budget. Haley said his bill is “top priority.” “This is such a priority item that we must handle this,” he said. “We must fulfill this funding even at a cost to some other things. But education is that important to me.” No one testified in opposition to the legislation Wednesday. SUPPORT NEWS YOU TRUST.
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Perry Gorrell, interim legislative liaison for the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, said raising the base teacher pay is the Commissioner of Education’s top priority. “We know that the greatest impact on student achievement is having highly qualified teachers for students. These two bills helped to ensure that,” he said. Otto Fajen, lobbyist for the Missouri branch of the National Education Association, said the teachers’ union would like lawmakers to consider small schools with under 100 kids when looking at funding. “While not that many of our members are going to benefit directly from the increase here, it sends a message that the legislature believes that entry pay and, overall, the earnings for teachers should resemble similar professions to make it a more viable choice going forward,” Fajen said. Steve Carroll, a lobbyist representing the Cooperating School Districts of Greater Kansas City and St. Louis Public Schools, said he woke up at nearly 4 a.m. thinking about these bills. He felt like his anxiety was pointless because the bills “probably won’t even make it across the finish line because of what’s going on in the Senate.” But he saw the salary of a baseball player in a news article and marveled at society’s “priorities.” He believes teachers are the ones more deserving of higher pay. GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
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Missouri Independent is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Missouri Independent maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jason Hancock for questions: info@missouriindependent.com. Follow Missouri Independent on Facebook and Twitter. Open enrollment legislation wins initial approval in Missouri Houseby Annelise Hanshaw, Missouri Independent A bill that would allow students to enroll in neighboring school districts won initial approval in the Missouri House for the fourth year in a row Tuesday on an 83-69 vote. It is the first bill to be debated by the full House this legislative session. It must be approved one more time by the House before it is sent to the Senate for consideration. Bill sponsor Rep. Brad Pollitt, a Republican from Sedalia, described the proposal as “minor compared to what others want to do.” “The status quo says the bill goes too far. The reform side says it doesn’t go far enough,” he said in his introduction of the bill. A nearly identical bill narrowly passed the House in a 85-68 vote last year, just three more than a constitutional majority of the chamber. New to the legislation this year is the creation of an online portal that would track the number of students who have applied to enroll in accepting districts. If passed, the legislation would allow students to leave their local school to enroll in districts that opt into the open enrollment. Districts are not required to add staff or programs, such as special education, for the program. Transportation would be parents’ responsibility, unless the child qualifies for free or reduced lunch or has transportation under an individualized education plan. The bill calls for a fund to pay for bussing these students. Pollitt placed a 3% cap on the number of students who can leave a district annually under open enrollment. He proposed a 1% cap for districts with a high number of students qualifying for free or reduced lunch, describing it as a compromise for the Senate. He removed the 1% cap upon advice from a caucus policy committee. Some worry that, without that provision, open enrollment could lead to resegregation in some areas. Rep. Kathy Steinhoff, a Columbia Democrat, complimented Pollitt but said the lack of “diversity protections” and other negatives “outweigh the positives.” “One of the concerns is that it’s going to create a slow drain for several schools and districts,” she said. Rep. Marlene Terry, a St. Louis Democrat, said the legislation would “destroy (her) school.” “We do agree that parents should have choices, but what I keep hearing is a better environment or a better education,” she said. “Until you can tell me how you’re going to fix the environment and the education in the public school system to where my children stay, I’m going to continually be against this bill.” Rep. Barbara Phifer, a Democrat from St. Louis, described open enrollment as a “patch on a big problem.” The problem, she said, is unequal funding of public schools. “We pretend that there is no school choice, but we have made an economic decision here in the state of Missouri that those who are wealthy get better education than those who are not wealthy,” Phifer said. “We can argue about that, and we can actually change the way that we fund public education so that we have more equity.” Rep. Peter Merideth, a St. Louis Democrat, said school funding was a timely topic. Earlier in the day, he had discussed the formula that determines state funding of public schools in the budget committee. He said the state funding has lagged behind inflation. Wealthy communities’ local funding has allowed schools to be better equipped, and those without deep pockets may lose students under open enrollment. Rep. Stephanie Hein, a Springfield Democrat, attempted to amend the bill to raise the base teacher pay to $46k statewide by the 2027-28 school year. The bill title would also change to “elementary and secondary education.” Her attempt to change the title failed on a 44-109 party-line vote after Pollitt said it opened the bill “to anything else to do with public education.” Pollitt said he was in favor of increasing teacher salaries but wanted his bill to stand alone. Last year, Pollitt’s bill died waiting to come to the floor of the Senate. He told The Independent Senate leaders attached his legislation to a bill about teacher recruitment and retention in an attempt to avoid a filibuster. GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
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Missouri Independent is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Missouri Independent maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jason Hancock for questions: info@missouriindependent.com. Follow Missouri Independent on Facebook and Twitter. Missouri governor’s final State of State touts abortion ban, infrastructure spendingby Jason Hancock, Missouri Independent In his final address to a joint session of the Missouri General Assembly, Gov. Mike Parson on Wednesday pointed to outlawing abortion, increasing infrastructure spending and appointing five statewide office holders as the legacy of his six years in office. “I’ll be leaving here with my head held high,” Parson told lawmakers during his annual State of the State address. Parson can’t seek re-election because of term limits. After years in the legislature, and 18 months as lieutenant governor, he was elevated to the state’s highest office in 2018 after then-Gov. Eric Greitens was forced to resign in disgrace. He was elected to a full four-year term in 2020. When he took over, Parson said, Missourians were “tired of the turmoil, political infighting and self involved personalities. They were tired of quitters. “We declared a fresh start and the return of stability,” he said. “We committed to ensuring the next generations have their opportunity at the American Dream. We promised the return of integrity. Above all, we promised to return a people first mentality to state government, and that’s our final commitment to Missourians. Until our final day, we’ll continue putting people first.” Twice during his speech he noted that abortion is illegal in Missouri, thanks to a bill he signed in 2019 that included a trigger that outlawed the procedure if the U.S. Supreme Court ever struck down Roe v. Wade. That Supreme Court ruling eventually came in 2022. Abortion-rights advocates have now launched an initiative petition campaign seeking to overturn the ban. “We fought the fight for life,” Parson said in his speech. Infrastructure spending has been the main thrust of Parson’s agenda during his time in office. He told lawmakers Wednesday that over the last six years Missouri has rebuilt more than 1,000 bridges and repaired 50% of its entire highway system. But the infrastructure project that could be his biggest legacy is Interstate 70. Parson had hoped to rebuild portions of the interstate as part of his budget proposal last year. Legislative leaders decided the governor’s plan didn’t go far enough, boosting funding to $1.4 billion in general revenue and $1.4 billion in borrowed funds to widen the interstate across the state. “The expansion of I-70 has been talked about in this building for decades. Decades of hot air. Decades of passing the buck,” he said. “Under our administration, this General Assembly and the leadership of (Senate Appropriations Chairman Lincoln) Hough, decades of inaction turned to action. This summer, construction on I-70 is set to begin in Columbia.” Parson also noted the fact that he’s filled vacancies in three statewide offices, appointing Vivek Malek as treasurer, Mike Kehoe as lieutenant governor and Andrew Bailey as attorney general. He previously appointed Eric Schmitt attorney general and Scott Fitzpatrick as treasurer. And he said his administration has “reshaped our Supreme Court and judiciary as a whole. We’ve protected Second Amendment rights, focused on law and order and safeguarded Missouri’s landmark castle doctrine.” Missouri has maintained its AAA bond rating, enacted three tax cuts and “paid down Missouri’s debt by over $600 million,” Parson said. He also bragged that the clemency backlog he inherited “has been totally cleared for the first time in decades.” “In less than six years,” he said, “we’ve accomplished more than most governors are able to in eight years.” Delivering the Democrats response to Parson’s speech, House Minority Leader Crystal Quade of Springfield was asked about the governor’s legacy. “The legacy of Gov. Parson is riddled with a lot of unfortunate events,” she said. “He talked about a lot of really great things that he accomplished, but we didn’t talk about the (Department of Revenue) director who had to get fired for fumbling the tax tables and charging Missourians too much in their taxes. We didn’t talk abouta Department of Health director who tracked women’s periods.” She added: “There are a lot of things that we could talk about that have not been great within this administration.” SUPPORT NEWS YOU TRUST.
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Missouri Independent is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Missouri Independent maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jason Hancock for questions: info@missouriindependent.com. Follow Missouri Independent on Facebook and Twitter. Missouri courts request $3.7 million to continue arduous marijuana expungement processby Rebecca Rivas, Missouri Independent Missouri circuit courts have cleared more than 100,000 marijuana charges from people’s criminal records so far — a mandate that was a bigselling point for those who voted to pass the constitutional amendment that legalized recreational marijuana in 2022. However, court officials said it’s hard to determine how many more charges are left because many court records are not digitized. The state initially identified digital cases that could potentially be eligible for expungement and gave that information to the circuit courts. “We’ve had about 100,000 cases expunged,” said Betsy AuBuchon, clerk of the Missouri Supreme Court, during a House appropriations committee meeting Wednesday, “but I can’t tell you of that how many more there are to go.” She said the current rate of cases reviewed and deemed eligible is about 10%. AuBuchon requested another $3.7 million in the coming budget year for Missouri courts to complete marijuana expungements. By law, any revenue the state collects from taxes on recreational marijuana sales, along with fees the businesses pay, must first go towards the state’s costs of regulating the program. Then it goes to expenses incurred by the court system for expunging certain marijuana offenses from people’s criminal records. Last year lawmakers signed off on $4.5 million for state courts to pay their employees overtime or to hire temp workers to complete themassive number of expungements required by law. They approved an additional $2.5 million in asupplemental budget on May 5. Circuit courts must request funds to reimburse their expenses for completing expungements from theCircuit Court Budget Committee, which oversees the special assistance program. So far, the committee has given $4.2 million to the county courts, said Beth Riggert, communications counsel of the Missouri Supreme Court. And the committee has allocated the funds to any circuit court that has requested it, she said. “Some circuit courts have advised they have not requested special assistance funds because they did not have current court clerks willing or able to work overtime,” Riggert said, “and/or have been unable to find qualified individuals to provide special assistance because the analysis required is complicated and better done by experienced personnel, such as retired clerks.” As of Jan. 2, Missouri courts have granted 103,558 expungements. Out of all the counties, Greene County has received the most funding, nearly $940,000, and has completed the most expungements at 4,306. After Greene, the counties that have completed the most expungements are not necessarily the largest counties or the ones that have received the most money. The second highest number is 3,515 from Laclede County, which has a population of 36,000. The county has received a little more than $35,000 from the special assistance program. In third place is St. Louis County, the state’s largest county with more than a million people, where court officials have processed 3,479 expungements. The county has received just over $135,000. The court has reviewed 11,300 files, a spokesman for the 21st Circuit Court said. Franklin County, which has a population of 104,000, is fourth, completing 3,200 expungements and receiving about $53,000. Franklin is just ahead of Jackson County, which has a population of 717,000. Jackson has completed 2,900 and received nearly $195,000. The constitution mandates the courts to expunge all marijuana-related misdemeanors by June 8 and felonies by Dec. 8. State Rep. Maggie Nurrenbern, a Democrat from Kansas City, asked AuBuchon how long it will take the courts to work through the backlog. AuBuchon, like circuit clerks statewide, couldn’t give an estimate. “We are doing our best,” AuBuchon said.
How far along are the courts?
Greene County Circuit Clerk Bryan Feemster told The Independent last week that he brought on four experienced retired clerks in February to work part-time on expungements and, “they hit the ground running.” Their work has been guided by a list of pre-screened cases, compiled by the Office of State Court Administrator. The office searched for several criminal charge codes that potentially could involve marijuana and provided that list to the courts. The clerks must read through each case on the list thoroughly, he said. “You have to look at every count in the case and see whether it actually had to do with marijuana or not,” he said. Feemster submits timesheets and supporting documentation to the office, which then provides payment to employees on their paychecks for the expungement work. He’s hired additional two people to embark on the heavy lifting of paper boxes and going through thousands of paper files that can’t be pre-screened by the state. Those six clerks are dedicated to expungements. “They don’t do anything else,” he said. During the 2022 campaign in support of the recreational marijuana ballot measure, supporters touted “automatic expungements” — meaning people who have already served their sentences for past charges don’t have to petition the court and go through a hearing to expunge those charges from their records. The courts must locate their records and make it as if their past marijuana charges never existed. “Let me be the first to tell you there is nothing automatic about that,” AuBuchon told legislators Wednesday. It’s a labor-intensive process, she said, that requires someone with legal experience to look through court files. That’s why most courts are relying on retired clerks. “It’s heavily frontloaded and probably not worth bringing in brand new full-time employees on the state dollar,” she said. “We really need people who know how to do that work. We are getting through those as quickly as we can.” And that’s particularly the case with paper records, Feemster said, because it’s all manual. “From 1989 back, we’re going through every single criminal record to find out whether there’s something in there that might qualify,” he said. “And it is, as you might imagine, very slow and tedious.” While Greene County has a team of retired clerks who Feemster was able to recruit, other county clerks say they have one or two extra people helping complete the task. Marcy Anderson was appointed to serve as Johnson County’s circuit clerk in July, and she inherited the expungement task. She said she has a judge and a retired clerk who come to help out as often as they can, in addition to what her regular team can accomplish. “I have not done any kind of research to see how far along we are,” Anderson said. “We just continue to do it every day.” Johnson County has a population of 54,000, and her team has completed 529 expungements, as of Jan. 2, receiving nearly $18,000 from the special assistance program. However her office, like every other county statewide, is simultaneously working on a large redacting project that’s required now that people can access court records on CaseNet. Both the redacting and expungement processes require extra help that she currently doesn’t have, but “more funds and more people” would be helpful. In Jackson County, court clerks have reviewed more than 20,000 files that include both felony and misdemeanor drug charges, said Valerie Hartman, spokeswoman for the 16th Judicial Circuit Court. The court has expunged nearly 3,000 charges. Some of those cases reviewed were related to marijuana, but many were not, she said. The court reviewed cases from 1989 through 2022 using data provided by the Office of State Courts Administrator, the Missouri Corrections Department and the Missouri State Highway Patrol, she said. All files that contained drug charges were included in the review. Now the court is researching how to access old criminal databases, in order to identify and review additional paper case files, Hartman said. “We have no information,” she said, “nor an estimate on how many additional drug cases await our review.” This story has been updated to reflect the discussion during Wednesday’s hearing. Missouri Independent is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Missouri Independent maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jason Hancock for questions: info@missouriindependent.com. Follow Missouri Independent on Facebook and Twitter. |
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