MISSOURI TRAVEL
COUNCIL LEGISLATIVE REPORT
The Missouri
Senate has approved a new state budget
that includes 21.6 million dollars for
the Division of Tourism, the largest
budget ever for the agency.
The
Senate-approved amount for the agency is
the same as adopted by the House of
Representatives so the Division's budget
will not be an item of discussion when a
joint Senate-House conference committee
irons out differences between the two
houses in the new budget.
The amount
approved by both the Senate and House is
the recommendation put forward by
Governor Matt Blunt.
Extension of the
sunset on the tourism funding formula
from 2010 to 2015 has been passed by
both houses. However, differences in
other aspects of the bill (HB 376) have
forced the bill into a joint
Senate-House conference committee for
compromise. No change will be made in
the formula sunset date in the
conference committee.
Awaiting debate in
the House is Senate-approved legislation
(SB 64) to change the school start law.
School could start no sooner than ten
days before Labor Day. However, a school
board could start school sooner than ten
days by holding a public meeting on an
earlier proposed start-up date, then
voting on that date at the meeting.
Also include in
this bill is an exemption for schools to
make up some days lost based on
inclement weather.
HB 360, which
increases the cap on film production tax
credits from $1.5 million to $10.5
million, was debated on the House floor
on April 2, but no action has taken
place since. Film production tax credit
language was added to HB 327, which was
passed in different forms in the House
and Senate. Those differences will be
worked out by a joint conference
committee, which is scheduled to meet
next week.
We're in the final
weeks of the current legislative
session, which means that bills with a
chance of passage should be moving at a
fairly good pace. Any bills not out of
their originating committees should be
considered dead.
Dale Amick
Legislative Consultant
