Each year as Legislative Session begins, there is a lot of “crystal ball gazing” in our state capital. The rumors come fast and furious, and various pundits try to anticipate how things will turn out when the General Assembly adjourns in May, even before a single bill is heard before a committee. There’s a temptation...Read More
The major take-away for me from the 2019 Legislative Session is the importance of working in coalition with others for evidence-based public policies.Read More
If you follow our work, you are likely aware that one of our policy priorities this year is to modernize Missouri’s outdated, medically inaccurate, stigmatizing HIV-specific criminal codes. You may remember a Weekly Perspective from the first week of February after an energizing committee hearing. If you haven’t paid that close of attention because you feel like...Read More
It has been clear to criminal justice advocates in Empower Missouri’s network for some time that poverty has been criminalized. Among the ways we have drawn attention to this topic were an April 2017 forum and a special Media Award to Tony Messenger in May 2018 for his series on policies that create debtors’ prisons,...Read More
On March 28, the Missouri House approved its version of the $29.23 billion state operating budget for the 2020 fiscal year. The budget process now continues on the Senate side of the building, with final agreement due by May 10, a week before adjournment of the 2019 Regular Session of the General Assembly. There is...Read More
The General Assembly has been on Legislative Spring Break this week, but will return to action on Monday, March 25. Conventional wisdom says that most bills that have not been passed by one chamber by break week will have difficulty making it through the entire process by adjournment of the Legislative Session in mid-May, but...Read More
I really couldn’t have imagined the hearing going any better. The room was packed, standing-room-only in the gallery, nearly every one of the 19 (!) committee members were present. A Republican from the rural bootheel sat next to a Democrat from the big city of St. Louis, and together Reps. Holly Rehder and Tracy McCreery...Read More
English 
Spanish