Legislature overrides veto
Rep. Allen Andrews
As you read this update, the Missouri Legislature will be in the process of wrapping up our final week of session.
Bills are moving at a rapid pace as less time is being spent in committee hearings and more time is being spent on the floor in debate.
The state received good news this week as the latest economic numbers show Missouri’s revenues continue to increase at a rate faster than anticipated.
To date, revenues have grown by 7.7 percent compared to last year. The number represents a considerable increase over what the governor had predicted, and based his budget on, with a 4.6 percent growth estimate.
The additional dollars prompted the governor to release some of the withheld funds he had kept back as he claimed revenues were insufficient to fund all of the items in the budget.
Already the state has paid back $400 million it had borrowed from the state’s reserve fund. In addition, this week the governor released another $67 million in withheld funding. These dollars will go to building projects on college campuses around the state, college scholarship programs, transportation funding for K-12 schools, and several other vital programs.
The members of the Missouri House and Senate worked together this week to override the governor’s veto of legislation meant to reform Missouri’s system of welfare so that it does a better job of moving folks out of poverty and toward self-sufficiency.
The override motion cleared the House by a vote of 113-42 and the Senate by a vote of 25-9.
The legislation will lower the lifetime benefits for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families recipients to 45 months from the current limit of 60 months.
In addition, it will add Missouri to the list of 37 other states that require welfare recipients to take immediate steps to seek employment in order to receive benefits.
The legislation then takes the savings generated by the reforms and invests them in child care, education, transportation and job training assistance for participants in the TANF program.
The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program is meant to be a short-term bridge back to self-sufficiency rather than a system that condemns Missouri families to a lifetime of poverty and dependence on government assistance.
This legislature has put much-needed, common sense reforms in place that will move the program back toward its intended purpose to help Missourians in need to get back on their feet and back into the workforce.
With the successful veto override, the bill is now set to become law on Aug. 28. However, most of the provisions in the bill will not take effect until Jan. 1, 2016.
