To: MAR Legislative Report List
From: Samuel G. Licklider
Subj: Legislative Report
Date: March 9, 2010
Important notice:
The Missouri Housing Development Commission (MHDC) at the end of 2009 rolled out an innovative program to help Missouri families buy a house. Styled the "HOPE" program-that stands for Home Ownership Purchase Enhancement-it uses a allocation of $15,000,000 to create an incentive equal to up to $1,250 for the 2009 property tax bill plus an additional $500 toward increased energy efficiency. That test can be met by doing some remodeling or even purchasing an Energy Star® appliance. The MHDC website has complete information on the program and can be reached at http://www.mhdc.com/homes/HOPE/index.htm
Fund Sweep:
On Wednesday, March 3 SB 1000 was heard before the Senate Appropriations Committee, somewhat unusual since typically Appropriations deals with, logically, the Appropriations bills and SB 1000 is a revenue bill. Actually it's a revenue grab bill, the revenue it is looking for is already collected it's just in a different account and SB 1000 proposes to move the selected revenue into the General Revenue account. For the most part the accounts affected are those in Professional Registration-interestingly the Missouri Real Estate Commission fund is not one of those targeted initially but, a study completed by some of the Appropriations staff included a line item taking a little over $2,000,000 out of the Real Estate Commission Fund. There didn't appear to be a great deal of interest in moving the bill, except from Senator Joan Bray who kept asking witnesses why they didn't support the move. Why is the bill a bad idea, the money in the several Professional Registration accounts was collected from licensees as a means to pay for services to licensees if these funds are used as general revenue funds that amounts to a tax increase on a limited number of people. If this continues we could see raids on funds followed by an increase in license fees to make up the shortfall.
License Law:
HB 1692 et al, has been set on the House Calendar. This bill contains the changes in the statute that broaden the business organizations that real estate licensees may use and the changes in the statute that clarify the exemption from unemployment compensation tax the real estate agents enjoy-you may recall that this is needed because of an awkward and fundamentally incorrect ruling by an administrative law judge. In addition the bill contains a number of other issues.
AMC:
HB 2152, the appraisal management company registration legislation has been assigned to the House Committee on Financial Institutions. It took a little discussion to get it there but it finally happened. We hope for a reasonably quick hearing on this important legislation.
Fair Tax:
The Senate took up Senator Chuck Purgeson's "Fair Tax" bill on Thursday, March 4th, with the legislative break staring them in the face the attention of the Senate was somewhat restrained but this gave Senator Purgeson an opportunity to discuss his bill and allow the members to think about the implications over the break-also gave them lots of time to draft amendments!!
Tax Credits:
There is still intense pressure on the whole issue of tax credits, the capitol rumor mill is working overtime coming up with interesting and implausible ideas supposedly floated by the administration. I know a lot of people in the administration, none of them would come up with the stupid ideas that the rumor mill proposes.
A tracking list is attached, the link should direct you to the state site, if they don't let me know.
It is unlikely that there will be a report next week since the Assembly is on break.
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