Missouri Lt. Governor Peter Kinder is once again filing suit against a health care measure. He and some other Republican lawmakers have announced plans to challenge the secretary of state’s office on newly issued ballot language for a health care measure that’s slated to appear on the November ballot.
Missouri expects to save about $44 million this year by refinancing some of its debt at lower interest rates.
Two separate boards of state officials gave preliminary authorization this week to the bond refinancing.
That action had been anticipated for some time. Gov. Jay Nixon had proposed to refinance more than $500 million of bonds as part of the budget plan he outlined in January. Lawmakers also had calculated the savings into the budget for the 2013 fiscal year that began this past Sunday.
Several Republicans are criticizing the ballot summaries that Missouri Democratic Secretary of State Robin Carnahan has prepared for measures dealing with health insurance and appellate judges.
The Republican-led Legislature referred both measures to the November ballot. Carnahan wrote the ballot summaries because lawmakers did not include their own.
Lawmakers who sponsored the measures say those summaries are misleading, and two GOP leaders pledged to file a lawsuit.
The Jefferson City Fire Department is asking voters to fund the plan that would purchase new equipment and trucks, cover technical upgrades, and pay for firefighter training. Captain Scott Spencer says unfortunately, a lot of the department’s equipment is getting old.
“This fire department improvement plan is for the community. It all transcends down to the end user, the taxpayer, the customer that might be relying on us for emergency medical services, which we’re going to be upgrading," said Spencer.
