Tuesday, August 11, 2015
PPP: Kinder Leads Koster
Public Policy Polling did a poll over the weekend. I put a PDF of it up in the special reports. It shows Democratic gubernatorial candidate Chris Koster with a lead over all Republican rivals – except Peter Kinder.
And in the US Senate race it has Roy Blunt leading Jason Kander 40% to 35%.
Romine for Pro Tem
Sen. Gary Romine is challenging Sen. Ron Richard for the pro tem position vacated by Tom Dempsey.
The conventional wisdom is that Richard is the strong favorite. But in my eyeballing of the Senate roster, it looks to be a close vote. My best guess (imagining where people have a preference of incentive to vote one way or the other) puts Richard ahead 11-10 with 3 that I’m clueless about. When forcing myself to place those three, I come out with an initial estimate of a 12-11 lead for Richard.
In other words, a very competitive race.
I assume Senate Republicans will vote on this over veto session, so it’s a month-long campaign.
City of Independence RFP Lobbying
According to the City of Independence website, they’re bidding out their lobbying services. “The City of Independence Purchasing Division issues a Request for Proposal for lobbying services, and the contract is subsequently approved by the City Council. The City is currently represented by Midwest Mediation & Consulting, LLC. The two-year contract covers November 1, 2013 to October 31, 2015. The contract amount for year one is $55,000; the contract amount for year two is $58,000.”
Midwest Mediation & Consulting is owned by Phil LeVota.
Ferguson Watch
New York Times reporting from Ferguson… “FERGUSON, Mo. — With scores of police officers in the streets and a portion of the region under a state of emergency, an edgy calm prevailed in this St. Louis suburb early Tuesday, one night after bursts of gunfire had led to fears of renewed unrest. Although nightfall brought intermittent clashes between protesters and the police — the St. Louis County police said the authorities had made 23 arrests along West Florissant Avenue — there were few signs of widening turmoil that might draw a sterner response…”
Sen. Maria Chappelle-Nadal tweet: AMERICA: Police are in riot gear in #Ferguson.
And then there’s this…. Former Rep. Jeff Roorda has written a book… “Ferghanistan: The War on Police” See the website here. “[A] cops-eye view of perhaps the most tumultuous year in the history of law enforcement told from the unique perspective of the most visible police spokesman to emerge from the smoldering ashes of Ferguson… Ferghanistan: The War On Police provides us with a refreshingly candid look at what really happened in Ferguson and how it affected those on the thin blue line that stood between law abiding citizens and the violent protestors that rained chaos on the St. Louis area and across the country. Roorda’s exclusive interviews with Darren Wilson and three of the St. Louis area police officers who were shot in the line of duty as the violence boiled over, gives depth and humanity to the men and women of law enforcement who were so relentlessly dehumanized…”
And
I missed this last Friday, Sen. Eric Schmitt penned an op/ed piece in the Wall Street Journal. See it here. Pull Quote: Many of our nation’s cities are beset with tension between residents and the elected officials and law-enforcement officers who serve them. In my home state of Missouri, weeks of protests in Ferguson began on Aug. 9, 2014, when a young African-American man named Michael Brown was shot and killed by a white police officer... One thing that shatters trust are schemes by local officials to drum up revenue by demanding their police officers write excessive traffic tickets—“taxation by citation”—which disproportionately hurts the poor... Between 2009 and 2014, St. Ann’s police department went from writing 3,500 tickets worth $722,000 to 10,000 tickets worth $2,834,000…”
Note: The mayor of St. Ann is former Rep. Michael Corcoran…
RYH4K
Raise Your Hand for Kids, the effort to raise the tobacco tax to fund early childhood services, filed their initiative petitions with the secretary of state’s office. See them here.
Republican attorney Eddie Greim filed the petitions, giving a bit of bipartisan sheen to tax hike.
Meanwhile rumors on the alternative tobacco tax proposal – “Missouri’s Promise” to fun higher education – are coming scattershot so it’s hard to assess their reliability. One has UM prez Tim Wolfe priming the fundraising pump. Another says that Dem gubernatorial nominee Chris Koster has “cooled on the idea.” And a third says that Dave Spence was considering taking an active role in the campaign. But with little in the way of a formal roll-out it’s hard to figure where the Promise team is in their plans, but it appears their coalition is still pretty fluid. We’ll see…
Bits
Politico’s Influence reports… “End Citizens United PAC, a new political action committee, is partnering with Ready PAC - previously known as Ready for Hillary - to back candidates who support campaign finance reform. The group is renting the pro-Clinton super PAC's list and has been able to raise over $2 million so far. The political action committee's ultimate goal is to pass a constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, but in the meantime, the group will also advocate for other campaign finance reform measures. It plans to create a super PAC arm next year and spend between $25 million and $30 million in the 2016 election cycle…. The group's senior advisers are Valerie Martin, who worked for Sen. Claire McCaskill's 2006 campaign, and Reed Adamson, who worked for Rep. Brad Schneider during the 2012 cycle.”
Teresa Hensley formed her campaign committee to run for attorney general as a Democrat. Her treasurer is Karen Meador.
KC Star editorial dings Sen. Kurt Schaefer. See it here. Pull Quote: In a letter to other senators, Schaefer, who often wanders into uninformed, near-hysterical verbiage, wrote that local minimum wage increases would “cause a tremendous amount of damage to our state’s economy.” The only way to undo the damage and protect local businesses, he wrote, is for the legislature to eliminate the earnings taxes enacted in Kansas City and St. Louis with the authority of local voters… While Schaefer’s idea appears to have limited support thus far, his position as chairman of the Senate appropriations committee gives it some weight. The prospective chairman of the House budget committee also says retaliation should be “on the table.” Schaefer, who is running for the GOP nomination for state attorney general, appears to be doing the bidding of multimillionaire Rex Sinquefield…
Lobbyists Registrations
Brian Grace, Rodney Boyd, and Kelvin Simmons added Northpark Partners LLC.
Scott Swain added Advantage Capital Partners; and deleted Scomm, and Missouri State Troopers Association.
Michael Racy deleted University of Missouri.
Ken Vuylsteke deleted Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys.
$5K+ Contributions
Eastern MO Laborers’ Education & Benevolent Fund - $40,300 from Construction & General Laborers' Local No. 660.
Progress KC PAC - $6,820 from Sly James for Mayor.
Birthdays
Happy birthday to Doug Healy.