A Senate bill with many issues regarding ethics reform has passed the Missouri Senate and gone to the committee stage in the House, but may soon be ready for its third and final reading.
The Government Oversight and Accountability committee discussed SB11, sponsored by Senate Majority Floor Leader Ron Richard. His bill, along with four other House ethics bills, were introduced to the committee Tuesday. These pieces of legislation could make many changes to the relationships between lobbyists and legislators, as well as other elected officials.
"They're steps in the right direction," said Rep. Jay Barnes, R-Jefferson City, and the committee chair. He added the committee would likely approve Richard's bill next week, possibly with amendments.
Richard's bill bars members of the Legislature from acting as paid political consultants for a candidate and establishes a two-year waiting period for exiting legislators to become lobbyists. It also requires lobbyists to report expenditures to each individual legislator in a committee, rather than just the committee. It also bans lobbyists from paying for plane tickets or other expenses incurred for out-of-state or out-of-country travel, Richard said.
"However, it exempts not-for-profit agencies from paying for travel and lodging for educational summits," he said during testimony to the committee. "This bill creates what we believe is transparency on the dinners and gifts legislators are receiving. ... It also allows and requires ethics training for elected officials and their staff members upon 120 days in their first term."
Committee members didn't question the bill, nor was there opposition from witnesses. Mike Reid of the Missouri Society of Government Consultants spoke for informational purposes, saying the bill cleans up some of the language on reporting expenditures.
Freshman legislator Rep. Justin Alferman, R-Hermann, introduced a bill to the committee prohibiting lobbyists from spending more than $5 at a time, or $25 annually, on government officials.
He said the goal is to simply eliminate lobbyists' gifts to judges, Supreme Court justices, lawmakers, the governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, secretary of state, state treasurer and state auditor.
"While I don't believe this is actually a huge problem ethically, it is all about public perception," he said. "I don't think I have to tell any of you that the public perception on this issue is pretty terrible, and what I am trying to do is heighten the citizens' perception of our state legislators as much as I can."
Alferman told the committee he was willing to amend the bill to address concerns, such as changing language to ban lobbying entities, rather than single lobbyists, from donating more than $25 annually.
"We think this is a good addition (to campaign finance reform)," said Jeanette Mott Oxford from Empower Missouri, formally the Missouri Association of Social Welfare. "When we serve in office we take an oath that we will not take anything other than the compensation that is supposed to be there for our jobs. So I think that this makes it more clear that we are living up to that."
Speaker Pro Tem Rep. Denny Hoskins, R-Warrensburg, had two bills before the committee.
"House Bill 271 deals with state auditor. ... The rest of the bill is that it allows, or gives authority, to the state auditor's office to inspect property, which may have been purchased with a grant," Hoskins said. "House Bill 438 has to do with changing the filing deadline for personal financial disclosure reports."
Harry Otto, deputy state auditor, spoke in favor of the first bill saying it was previously passed and signed by Gov. Jay Nixon under the condition there was change in the language to make it more clear the auditor's office was not being granted additional authority to review income tax returns. However, the bill, which reflected the governor's suggestions, died in the Senate on the last day of the 2014 session.
This bill also has an amendment that will allow the auditor to contact law enforcement in case of the discovery of wrongdoing during an audit. At the moment, the law keeps auditors from contacting the authorities until the audit is complete, Otto said.
Hoskins' second bill changes the filing for personal financial disclosure reports from an annual to a biannual deadline.
The last issue the committee covered was a bill by Rep. Robert Ross, R-Yukon, which prohibits state agencies from employing lobbyists.
"State agencies have one and occasionally two lobbyists advocating policy or for an additional program or more funding," Ross said. "Fundamentally I just believe it is wrong. I believe it is wrong for taxpayers to have their dollars taken from them to pay lobbyists to advocate for things that are not in their best interest."
Ross added that the program will save more than $1.7 million, even though it had a fiscal note of $0. Ross calculated that number by looking at state expenses from the lobbyists working for the executive branch of the state government, he said.
No one was able to speak in opposition of this bill because the hearing was cut short. Barnes suggested for those there in opposition to fill out a witness form, adding they will get a chance to speak next week.