Filing season began with a bit of an enigma - what would Rachel Storch do? She didn't file for re-election in her district or signal her intentions in any way. Instead, Amy Hilgemann, wife of the previous state representative, filed for the primary. (Full disclosure: I live in the 64th and serve on my ward organization's executive board with both Amy and Bob Hilgemann.)
I assumed that this meant for sure that either Hilgemann had a big dispute with Storch, or that she had a clear idea of what Storch's immediate plans were, but when I asked Hilgemann, she had no clue what Storch was going to do. Nobody else I talked to knew, either.
Fast forward to yesterday, when former 28th Ward Alderman Dan McGuire filed in the late afternoon. He can raise money and has a lot of connections, including an inside track to the 28th Ward Democratic Club endorsement, which would be nice to have considering that the 28th is the highest turnout ward in the district.
And today, Susan Carlson jumped into the race. She's a fellow member of the Women's Political Caucus, so I wonder if she might be getting the nod from Storch herself, and I should stress that this last bit is pure conjecture on my part.
Lastly, now that multiple candidates have jumped into the race, I wonder if we might see another candidate join the fray simply because there's no overwhelming favorite right now.
As for Storch, her intentions still remain murky. She might challenge Joe Keaveny in the 4th Senatorial District after losing in the committee selection process last fall, or she might bide her time and hope to be appointed to Secretary of State if Robin Carnahan is successful in her US Senate bid. Or she might find other another career and life path. If she's challenging Keaveny, we'll find out by end of day on March 30th.
Speaking of the state's need to find ways to stretch its dollars, Rep. Rachel Storch, D-St. Louis, had some interesting observations about Chief Justice William Ray Price, Jr.'s speech recommending that we incarcerate fewer people. It seems she doesn't get the sense that the Honorable Judge got through to Republicans in the legislature.
Despite how the retrograde "thinkers" who control our lege fail to grasp the concept, Price's idea is a hot topic among those of us in the reality based world. Monday's Post-Dispatch took up the torch where Price left off and specifically recommended "just for starters":
• Drug courts need more funding. This is the low-hanging fruit in criminal justice reform - the chance to save serious money by ending the cycle of crime and keeping nonviolent, drug-related offenders out of prison. A lack of funding means state leaders aren't serious.
• Leaders in rural counties must start to deal with nonviolent offenders in their own communities. If their prosecutors and judges insist on sending everyone to prison, then local taxpayers should be forced to pick up the tab.
• And, Gov. Jay Nixon should convene a panel of top law enforcement, legislative and judicial officials. Their task over the next 120 days should be to develop a plan for closing five of Missouri's 21 adult correctional institutions over the next five years - one a year for five years - using part of the savings to support alternatives to incarceration for nonviolent offenders.
Missouri desperately needs to get smart on corrections. Necessity is the surest path to progress.
Hey, even the Brits know what we should be doing, as witness this video of a quiz show/comedy routine. So why don't we?
Jesus wasn't the only one who has ever had just a few loaves and fishes to feed a throng. This year, every director of a state agency in Missouri knows how it feels to try to do almost as much as ever with only fives loaves and two fishes. That was the message from the panelists at the Missouri Budget Forum last Friday, sponsored by the Nonprofit Services Center and moderated by Dr. James Kimmel. Ron Levy, head of the Department of Social Services, the largest department in the state, with a budget of $8 billion, showed a slide depicting the fact that until 2002, the state had not, in more than a quarter of a century, experienced a drop in revenue. '02 and '03 were bad years, but the drop in revenue in '09 rivaled the drops of those two years put together.
Rep. Rachel Storch, D-St. Louis, serves on the House Budget Committee. She smiled ruefully that there's a difference between playing the hand you're dealt and fretting that the economic structure is a house of cards. Perhaps Storch would feel more upbeat if Missouri were like Oregon, which is one of nine states to raise taxes on the wealthy this year. Right. When hell freezes over. Meantime, some revenue enhancement ideas being seriously considered are: levying an internet sales tax and raising cigarette taxes. One of the Carolinas is about to do the latter, and when it does, Missouri will have the lowest cigarette tax in the country.
The funding issue that will drive the budget this year, Storch says, is that the public school foundation formula is going to require an additional $87 million. Nixon has found $18 million of that. Where the other $59 million will come from, nobody knows.
And looking beyond this year, when we at least have stimulus funds to cushion the blow, the picture is bleak. We could be facing a one billion dollar shortfall in FY 2011.
Even with the stimulus funds, Margaret Donnelly, Director of Health and Senior Services, pointed out that she had to pare 130 jobs--despite the fact, for example, that senior abuse and neglect hotline calls were up 9 percent last year. And those calls have to be answered. She had high praise for Governor Nixon in this tough economic environment:
I'd use the word ditzy--"flighty and easily confused"--to describe the Republican leadership of the House Budget Committee if it weren't for the second part of the definition: "mildly or harmlessly eccentric." I asked a non-ditz to explain why Icet and Stream aren't "harmless".
SMP: OK, this is Representative Rachel Storch of St. Louis, and Rachel, could you tell us what you've observed this session about how House Republicans have zig zagged on the budget without apparent direction?
Storch: [inaudible] It seems like every couple of weeks we discover a new plan from the Republican majority about what they want to do with budget funds and stimulus funds. At the beginning of the session, they were talking about not accepting stimulus funds at all and sending it back to Washington where it would probably be allocated to other states. Then, as of four or five weeks ago, they had passed a bill through the budget committee that spent a billion and a half dollars. Three days later, they reversed course and said they wanted to scratch that bill and pass legislation that would implement a billion dollar tax cut with stimulus funds. And then just last week, they reversed course once again and did pass a stimulus budget bill for about $780 billion, uh, million dollars, excuse me.
The larger issue is that we're not doing the kind of long term planning and due diligence that we should be when we have the opportunity we do coming out of Washington with the federal stimulus. I would like to see some money set aside for next year. We don't know how quickly the economy is going to turn around, and the stimulus funds Missouri receives are supposed to last for 27 months. So not only should we be setting some money aside for that proverbial rainy day, but in addition to that, I think we really want to take a long, hard look at our top priorities and make sure that we are using those funds to best invest in the kind of large scale infrastructure projects that we might not have an opportunity to do in a normal year.
But with these stimulus funds, we can really take action to strengthen our long term future as a state. And that's what the people of Missouri deserve from their policy makers, that kind of deliberation, the best possible policy making, with an eye toward both short term stimulation of the economy and job creation, but also long term planning.
I spoke this morning with Representative Rachel Storch (D-64) in her office before the start of the day's activities on the House floor. Our discussion touched on the legislative session, term limits, health care and economic development. And a final question about the Secretary of State's office.
Representative Rachel Storch in her office in the state capitol building.
Show Me Progress: ...Is it just more insane now?
Representative Rachel Storch: Well, it's not so much that it's crazier. It's just that with the term limits we have of these people that don't understand the issues and they don't understand the process, and what's worse, they don't care.
SMP: I've heard this before, people talk about institutional memory. And, is there much institutional memory? Or where does the institutional memory come from if there is any?
Representative Storch: Well, we have one legislator who was here for twelve years before he ran this time, that's Chris Kelly. But, he's the only who's here that has, you know, that extent of knowledge of the process. And, you know, I'll tell you even though people like to make fun of the legislature, make fun of the legislative process, something like the budget is really complicated. And it simply takes time to get your arms around it to understand how that process, to understand what the issues are, to understand the needs of the different state agencies and the different programs around the state. So, you know, I think at the end of the day, the people of Missouri really suffer because the quality of the policy making is not as good...
While speaking to West County Dems who were in the capitol on Tuesday, Rachel Storch commented about the most--and least--effective ways of contacting legislators. The most effective, of course, is personal contact. But, you know, how often is it feasible for you to rush to Jeff City so you can tell your rep and senator what you think? If that's practically impossible, e-mail, on the other hand, is a cinch. And it's not a bad way to get heard, especially if it's not part of an e-mail blast. What surprised me, though, was that Storch said phone calls are the least effective. You almost always talk to a staffer, who may or may not pass the message along. If you want to be heard, and don't want to actually drive to J.C., what's the most effective way to get your message noticed? A hand written letter, says Storch.
Via Political Fix, my own State Rep. Rachel Storch was just named "New Democrat of the Month" by the Democratic Leadership Council. The reasoning given for the award (Storch's support of tax credits for biotech research in Missouri) isn't a bad one, but the DLC itself is positively awful. Hopefully Storch won't wear this badge too proudly.
We've previously written about this Democratic primary race between incumbent Rachel Storch and challenger Michael Roberts. On Tuesday this one is for all the marbles since no republican filed.
There is no tomorrow for these candidates. The expenditures are telling. Let's take a look at the eight day before the election reports filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission. First, for Rachel Storch:
I know that sometimes I tend to focus on races close to home, but this kind of crap has implications across the state. Mike Roberts is challenging HDCC co-chair Rachel Storch in the primary for House District 64. Fine - I have no particular problem with primaries, because incumbents shouldn't feel like they have an automatic claim on the seat until term-limited.
I do, however, question the wisdom of a Democrat challenging one of the incumbents in charge of recruiting, coordinating, and fundraising for Democratic candidates all over Missouri. Further, I can't even tell why he's running against Rachel. Looking at his website, Roberts doesn't have any specific beef with Rachel about ideology or process. He lists his qualifications, but they don't outshine Rachel's. And now he's making stuff up in order to gain some sort of traction.
At a joint reception with Maria Chappelle-Nadal last month, Rachel was asked how she felt about getting a primary challenge. She answered (with just a hint of frustration) that she didn't understand why someone who never contacted her about any concern he might have had for the district would suddenly jump in the race against her. Now she has to take time off from raising money for House candidates in competitive districts, because she can't do that, run in a primary, AND serve her current duties as state representative and hope to do all three very well.
Perhaps someone could fill me in on why Mike Roberts is running, other than vanity?
Since I posted a piece of Olivo lit a couple of weeks ago, and since I have a pile of political literature that the world needs to see, I'll post one each week in our Friday morning open thread.
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