MOScout Daily Update: Concern About Avian Flu - Schaefer Sees Trump Impact at DNR - STL Crime Continues Downward Trend and more…
Quick Friday update…
Sharpe Wants Muscular Response To Avian Flu
In yesterday’s House Budget Committee hearing with the Department of Agriculture, Rep. Greg Sharpe raised concerns about readiness of the state to respond to the avian flu and its potential to damage the farming industry.
Rep. Sharpe: [D]o you think we’re set up to squash a severe outbreak like seems like is happening in the southwest corner?.. Do we have enough planning?.. I mean you never have enough when something happens but speculatively wise if some outbreak happened at Clarence with swine or whatever do we really have enough of a plan to squash this from the state level?
Ag Director Chris Chinn: Anytime that we have a foreign animal disease outbreak the U.S. Department of Agriculture is the lead agency and we, as a state, play a supportive role to them… We have a very small team when it comes to our disease control team, and I believe somewhere later we have one FTE request for this very issue. We have not had enough staff at the Department of Agriculture to respond to this alone, so we have teams on the ground from the U.S. Department of Agriculture as well helping work alongside our team to address the challenges that the avian influenza outbreak has brought to the state of Missouri…
And then later, Sharpe again: What we talked about earlier, that we had a tendency not to respond to bad things until after they've happened… the discretion I think the legislature might give your department to respond with a very aggressive plan. With Covid I thought we somewhat great deal overreacted because we get we can’t really tell people to [isolate]. But on these farms, we kind of can lock them down as much as we can where there’s an outbreak. So I hope that our various departments will band together and cross some turf… that we would have a very aggressive response…. I hope your department – and you're getting one FTE but maybe you're needing more – to have a strike force to stamp and isolate these things…
Trumpy Changes Coming to DNR
In the House Budget Committee hearing with the Department of Natural Resources, Director Kurt Schaefer said he see big changes coming to the regulatory environment at DNR due to the Trump Administration.
Schaefer: President Trump did issue two executive orders two weeks ago… And if you read those, what you’re going to find is there is going to be, for the first time probably ever, a reevaluation of air permitting as it relates to energy, as well as it relates to mineral production… I personally believe there are big changes coming there that we have never seen before. How we deal with those is going to be very interesting, but I think we have tremendous potential in the state of Missouri to give us discretion and freedom to have a little more control over our economy and how we protect human health and the environment.
Read the Trump executive orders here…
· Trump order on declaring an energy emergency.
· Trump order on unleashing American energy.
Ridder to Schmitt
Sen. Travis Fitzwater announced on the Senate floor Thursday that his chief of staff Ben Ridder is leaving and moving to St. Louis.
· He’ll be joining Eric Schmitt’s staff.
STL Crime Continues Downward Trend
Press release: Following an 11-year-low in homicides in 2024, the City of St. Louis experienced a continued decrease in violent and property crimes in January of 2025, with the number of homicides committed in the City decreasing by 55% compared to January of 2024.
· Mayor Tishaura O. Jones: “We will keep building a safer St. Louis with the help of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department, the Circuit Attorney’s Office, the Office of Violence Prevention, and our community partners. I invite legislators in Jefferson City to take a look at this month’s report and the data available on our police department’s website.”
Gubby Appts
Governor Mike Kehoe appointed Timothy Flora as a member of the Board of Private Investigator and Private Fire Investigator Examiners.
And he withdrew his appointment of Alfred Brandt to the State Milk Board.
eMailbag…
· On anonymous MOFC members: I think if the Missouri Freedom Caucus wants you to print their press releases, they need to disclose who their members are so we know who these press releases represent.
· On Webber: Interesting that Senator Webber, who has filed bills to undo parts of the deal that were made in SB 727, is arguing against undoing deals made last year on different pieces of legislation.
$5K+ Contributions
House Republican Campaign Committee, Inc - $10,000 from NextEra Energy Transmission (Juno Beach, FL).
Lobbyist Registrations
Jacqueline Bardgett and Chris Roepe added Missouri State Council of Fire Fighters.
Sarah Wood Martin added CyberUP.
Jill Cavagnaro added KLEO-Inc.
Tom Dempsey deleted Ehawk, Inc.
Birthdays
Happy birthday to Brandt Shields.