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Politically Speaking: Rep. Travis Fitzwater on crafting a budget when tax revenue runs short

St. Louis Public Radio | By Jason Rosenbaum,
Jo Mannies
Published April 12, 2017 at 5:11 AM CDT
Travis Fitzwater has served in the Missouri House of Representatives since 2015.
Marshall Griffin I St. Louis Public Radio
Travis Fitzwater has served in the Missouri House of Representatives since 2015.

On the latest edition of the Politically Speaking podcast, St. Louis Public Radio’s Jason Rosenbaum and Jo Mannies welcome state Rep. Travis Fitzwater to the program for the first time.

 

The Holts Summit Republican represents the 49th House District, which covers parts of Callaway and Cole counties in central Missouri. Before running for office, Fitzwater worked for the Missouri Pharmacy Association, first as the marketing coordinator, and, later, chief operating officer.  

 

 Click here to Rep. Travis Fitzwater's appearance on Politically Speaking.

 

Fitzwater first ran for office in 2014, when then-Rep. Jeanie Riddle left to seek a state Senate seat. While the 49th District’svoters lean Republican, Fitzwater had a tough battle against former House majority leader and Democratic Rep. Gracia Backer, whom Fitzwater ultimately defeated.

 

Since getting elected, Fitzwater was appointed as the vice chairman of the House Workforce Development Committee, which handles bills related to state job training programs. He’ssponsored legislationthat would allow nonprofit groups to run “adult high school” programs for people didn’t receive a high school diploma. That bill is awaiting action in the Missouri Senate.  

 

Here’s what Fitzwater had to say during the show:

  • He is a strong backer of legislation establishing a statewide regulatory framework for ride-hailing companies like Uber and Lyft — effectively barring cities from regulating the companies. “The idea is that we don’t want municipalities to shut down these innovative technologies when we have a statewide framework that puts some pretty good regulations on these companies,” he said.
  • On its face, Fitzwater said St. Joseph Republican Sen. Rob Schaaf’s decision to stop filibustering a prescription drug monitoring program is “encouraging.” But he said Schaaf’s insistence that the final bill require doctors to use the database could be a “poison pill for the bill.”
  • While House members were able to place more money in the state budget for higher education (though it has not gone through the Senate yet),Fitzwatersaid universities and colleges will still end up taking a financial hit this year. “I think you’d have to cut the K-12 funding that we put in and put into higheredif you want to make a dent,” he said. “And I think that’s going to be hard to do on a large scale.”
  • Fitzwater has high marks for how GOPGov. EricGreitenshas conducted himself in his first few months in office. “We’re three months in,” he said. “This is a new situation. We have a governor who hasn’t been in a governing role before. So there’s certainly a learning curve.”

Follow Jason Rosenbaum on Twitter: @jrosenbaum

 

Follow Jo Mannies on Twitter: @jmannies

 

Follow Travis Fitzwater on Twitter: @travisfitzwater

 

Music: “Narcolepsy” by Third Eye Blind  

Copyright 2021 St. Louis Public Radio. To see more, visit St. Louis Public Radio.

Missouri News
Jason Rosenbaum
Since entering the world of professional journalism in 2006, Jason Rosenbaum dove head first into the world of politics, policy and even rock and roll music. A graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism, Rosenbaum spent more than four years in the Missouri State Capitol writing for the Columbia Daily Tribune, Missouri Lawyers Media and the St. Louis Beacon.
See stories by Jason Rosenbaum
Jo Mannies
Jo Mannies has been covering Missouri politics and government for almost four decades, much of that time as a reporter and columnist at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. She was the first woman to cover St. Louis City Hall, was the newspaper’s second woman sportswriter in its history, and spent four years in the Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau. She joined the St. Louis Beacon in 2009. She has won several local, regional and national awards, and has covered every president since Jimmy Carter. She scared fellow first-graders in the late 1950s when she showed them how close Alaska was to Russia and met Richard M. Nixon when she was in high school. She graduated from Valparaiso University in northwest Indiana, and was the daughter of a high school basketball coach. She is married and has two grown children, both lawyers. She’s a history and movie buff, cultivates a massive flower garden, and bakes banana bread regularly for her colleagues.
See stories by Jo Mannies