Wrap Up Of Legislative Session
It was a long night at the state house as lawmakers try to tie up the lose ends on the last day.
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It was a long night at the state house as lawmakers try to tie up the lose ends on the last day.
But lawmakers accomplished what they are constitutionally obligated to do. They passed an education budget that added a teacher pay raise.
They also passed a general fund that added $15 million to Medicaid but is still $85 million short. They also started the impeachment process of the governor and setup a process for the future. If lawmakers get enough signatures to impeach, it then goes to a committee to look into allegations of wrong doing.
Representative Steve Clouse says he’d give lawmakers a B- as a grade for their performance this session. Rep. Steve Clouse, (R) Ozark said, “We do have a good education budget. We have an adequate general fund budget except for medicaid. We could have had an adequate general fund budget including medicaid if we could have gotten the BP bill passed and that would have freed up $70 million. But we are going to have to go back to the drawing board on that particular issue.”
There’s talk that the governor will call legislators back for a special session to address the shortfall in Medicaid funding. A committee will still meet throughout the summer to hear from Medicaid officials. And also the committee looking into allegations swarming the governor will continue to meet throughout the summer. So it may be the final day today, but still much more to come at the state house in the coming weeks.
