The St. Louis Post-Dispatch and The Kansas City Star, March 12
Attention, Gov. Greitens! Our joint call for greater transparency, accountability
Gov. Eric Greitens is collaborating in the creation of a bogus nonprofit “social welfare” organization clearly designed to provide unfiltered propaganda about his political agenda.
The nonprofit could collect unlimited anonymous contributions from donors seeking influence in the state. It is an insult to Missouri voters.
We feel so strongly about the governor’s lack of transparency and repeated attempts to evade the Missouri news media that the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and The Kansas City Star are publishing this joint editorial, hoping Greitens will change course.
March 12-18 is Sunshine Week, when American news organizations remind the public - and public servants - about the importance of accountability and transparency as backbones of a properly functioning democracy.
Missourians understand this. They demand to know who is buying influence with their politicians.
In November, 70 percent of Missourians approved Constitutional Amendment 2. The ballot measure plainly states the public interest is best served by limiting campaign contributions, fully disclosing political fundraising and spending, and enforcing the state’s campaign finance laws.
Now, barely four months later, a dark money committee has been established that Greitens can use to thumb his nose at the voters’ will. His senior adviser, Austin Chambers, had the gall to tell The Star that the only people who care about transparency are “reporters and Democratic operatives.”
He forgot about the 1,894,870 Missourians who voted “yes” on Amendment 2.
The dark money group, called A New Missouri Inc., is worrisome enough. But the governor’s campaign accepted nearly $2 million in a dark money donation from an obscure group, and he has to date hidden the donors to his inaugural.
This pattern of secret fundraising and secret spending is clear, disturbing and unacceptable.
We’d like to ask the governor about this. So far, no luck. Save for a very brief and short-circuited March 2 news conference, he’s assiduously ducked Missouri reporters and stonewalled inquiries almost since his inauguration. Security staffers block reporters from getting close to him with microphones and notebooks.
He has spoken to hand-picked audiences. He’s gone on Facebook Live to answer innocuous inquiries from supporters. But real questions, from real journalists? No.
He’s betting Missourians don’t care.
A reminder: Greitens campaigned against “corrupt career politicians” in Jefferson City. He’s emphasized minor reforms such as eliminating lobbyist-paid meals - even as dark money contributions open the door to secret influence on an epic scale.
We offer the Legislature some advice: Pass the governor’s ethics reform proposals, but attach an amendment requiring all nonprofit social welfare groups in Missouri to publicly disclose their donations and spending on a quarterly basis.
Then dare Greitens to veto that bill. We’ll soon know if his commitment to ethics reform is real.
In honor of Sunshine Week, we also hope Greitens summons the courage to hold a full-blown press conference. Missourians want more than a Facebook governor.
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The Columbia Daily-Tribune, March 9
UM audit: Twisting in the wind
State Auditor Nicole Galloway issued a report critical of University of Missouri “incentive” payments made to top administrators since July 1, 2014.
Rather than incentives for meeting work goals, Galloway said the payments were bonuses paid after the fact with no quid pro quo involved. Among others, she cited money paid to former MU Chancellor R. Bowen Loftin, UM System General Counsel Steve Owens, UMKC Chancellor Leo Morton and former UM System President Tim Wolfe.
“It appears the university was using these items to boost administrators’ pay without having to disclose it publicly,” Galloway said. The Missouri Constitution prohibits the state from giving extra pay to workers or contractors for work already performed.
Overall, the auditor gave the university a “fair” rating, next to the lowest among four ranging from “excellent” to “poor.”
Galloway properly avoided giving an opinion about whether individual payments were warranted, but her critique of the methodology raises plenty of questions.
President Wolfe and Chancellor Loftin left their jobs in the midst of turmoil over the way system and campus administrators reacted to student protests. Loftin already was under unrelated fire on the MU campus, and his boss, President Wolfe, negotiated the chancellor’s peaceful resignation by providing a job description and expensive compensation having little or nothing to do with work needed for the university.
Wolfe, General Counsel Owens and UMKC Chancellor Morton were simply paid more under the system Galloway characterized as bogus. In response, the university says it must pay competitive salaries, but the auditor says the extra money was not accounted for as part of regular budgeted salary compensation. Interim President Mike Middleton was not among the top 18 administrators receiving bonuses.
Gov. Eric Greitens says he won’t support tax money paid to university administrators without proven results, and he criticizes UM leaders for taking the money while proposing tuition increases. Greitens engages in political opportunism, but he was given the green light by university errors.
Some criticize Counsel Owens for failing to provide better guidance to UM curators. There is some basis for this, but Owens operates in the smog of traditional university attitudes toward full disclosure. MU and UM, like too many other large public bureaucracies, are complex and arcane enough to work more in the dark than best practices would demand. No overriding authority exists within the university making sure the ethics of transparency and disclosure are carefully followed. Indeed, one can find high-level officers whose duties include advising how the institution can skirt Sunshine Law requirements, a skill not listed in official job descriptions but coveted and well compensated nevertheless.
The sort of leadership required to avoid troubles like Galloway outlines must come from the highest authority in University Hall. The president of the UM System can’t delegate ethics to some lower official. He or she must impose it plainly in daily activities and rules emanating straight from the top office so all hands will follow unthinkingly. Mun Choi, only this month installed as the next UM president, has a perfect opportunity to establish this atmosphere, made easier - indeed, mandatory - by Galloway’s report. Go, Choi, go.
Finally, let us recognize the good work of Auditor Nicole Galloway herself, formerly of Boone County, who shows her intent to call it like she finds it. If the university reacts properly to her report, the institution and its constituents everywhere will benefit.
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The Jefferson City News-Tribune, March 8
Statewide drug monitoring would save lives
Last month, we ran a heartbreaking op-ed piece from Gary Henson, a former Jefferson City resident whose eldest son, Garrett, had died after a lethal combination of two prescription drugs.
While in rehab, Garrett explained to his father how he would meet a dealer at a Kansas City park. The dealer paid people to fake the need for pain/anti-anxiety medications. The pills were then taken into Kansas and resold to people who were addicted to the pills.
After rehab, Garrett relapsed and died from a lethal combination of Xanax, an anti-anxiety drug, and OxyContin, a powerful narcotic used to relieve pain.
Now, his father is crusading for Missouri to adopt a prescription drug monitoring program (PDMP). Missouri is the only state that doesn’t have one.
But that could change this year. The Senate last week passed a bill to create a statewide prescription drug tracking database, which could bring Missouri into line with every other state, the Associated Press reported.
The database would track when prescriptions for controlled substances are written and filled, the AP reported. The goal is to prevent “doctor shopping,” the practice of going to several doctors to get prescriptions for painkillers and other drugs.
Ironically, the bill is being sponsored by Sen. Rob Schaaf, a PDMP critic who has blocked such bills in the past. He said his version includes enough security to ensure patient data is protected.
Data security has been, perhaps, the biggest concern of Schaaf and other opponents. The AP said the database could indicate whether a patient has seen another doctor or pharmacist within the past 180 days. If the patient has, then the last four digits of the patient’s Social Security number could be used to see more detailed records and determine whether they should be prescribed drugs.
Prescription data would be purged after 180 days, the AP said.
A statewide bill would nullify local programs being implemented by some counties. The Cole County Commission and Jefferson City Council both have agreed to work together on a drug monitoring program.
We urge the House to pass a version of the bill that, while keeping privacy and security protections, is at least as effective as the ones counties are adopting on their own.
We believe such a system has the ability to save lives and reduce the heartbreak that Henson and countless other parents have endured.
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The St. Joseph News-Press, March 11
Focus on prisons is merited
It’s too early to tell whether Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens can markedly improve the administration of the state’s corrections system.
Still, his early actions and comments on the subject are promising.
Greitens, a Republican fresh off his first election to public office, signaled his interest in the subject well before he took over in January from long-serving Democrat Jay Nixon. In December Greitens chose North Carolina Community Corrections Director Anne Precythe to lead the Department of Corrections - an agency he described as “broken.”
It was presumed Greitens was referring primarily to a management scandal in the department, but it since has become obvious his interests are broader than that.
The previous director was asked to resign after a news report showed the state spent more than $7.5 million on settlements and judgments between 2012 and 2016 related to allegations of harassment and retaliation.
“Our corrections officers struggle in a culture of harassment and neglect, in a department with low morale and shockingly high turnover,” Greitens said at the time. “These men and women do important work. They need our help.”
Greitens, who has been slow to embrace the concept of regularly submitting himself to questions from reporters, did just that earlier this month at a forum. He spoke again of the need to support corrections workers.
“We need to do some work to get to all of the front-line folks who are doing hard work and often putting their own safety at risk on behalf of all of us to keep us safe,” he said. “We need to get down and let them know, as I and Anne have, that change is on the way.”
The new governor also seems unusually interested in tackling the stubborn problem of ex-cons who reoffend.
“We need to build a Department of Corrections that actually corrects things,” Greitens told the forum.
“So we’re going to build a system where . from the first day that somebody enters the prison system, we’ve got a plan in place and programs in place so that they can leave prison, come out, get a job, pay taxes, and if they have kids, become a role model to their kids.
“Right now, we don’t have that plan, that program, that system in place.”
Across the country, failure to provide true inmate rehabilitation is a persistent problem. Just keeping the focus on Missouri, it’s clear we need more effective programs.
Statistics show 97 percent of offenders in Missouri prisons eventually will be released back into the community. However, according to a 2015 calculation, the state’s recidivism rate - the pace at which ex-offenders reoffend - is a concerning 46 percent.
Greitens is focused on an important issue. Taxpayers should pay close attention to his attempts at reform.
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