Senate rejects pay raise for lawmakers, statewide officials and judges (MO)

JEFFERSON CITY — The Missouri Senate voted 31-3 Thursday to reject an 11.1 percent pay raise for lawmakers and a 16.6 percent raise for statewide elected officials after an opponent of the raises threatened to invoke a rarely used rule to force the vote.

On Wednesday, lawmakers supporting the raises blocked the resolution sponsored in the Senate by Sen. Rob Schaaf, R-St. Joseph, which would reject the raise recommended by the Missouri Citizens’ Commission on Compensation for Elected Officials. That seemed to put the matter to rest until Schaaf announced he was looking for four other members to sign a petition to shut off debate.

Details in his own words from Schaaf's Facebook page:

Yesterday I stepped out on a ledge.

The day before, as you read in the post below, two democrat senators had blocked the resolution I was handling. It turned back the 11% pay raise for state legislators and elected officials that would have gone into effect had we not passed the resolution by Feb 1 (or Saturday night at midnight.)

I spent Wednesday night thinking about this, and monitored reaction to what had happened. People were outraged that the legislature would take such a huge pay increase while state employees are the lowest paid in the nation. (my emphasis) And they were not blaming just the one democrat who was openly filibustering it; they were blaming the Republican super-majority legislature for allowing it to happen.

I awoke yesterday morning and realized what I needed to do.

On arrival at the capitol, I asked Senate Research to draft a previous question motion for me. I told nobody but my own staff (and my family) what I planned to do. I did not inform the leadership nor any other senator of my plan, either. I wanted to take full responsibility for the plan, and let each senator decide whether or not they wanted to play a part.

When we went into session and got to the order of business of Concurrent Resolutions, I brought up the HCR I had laid over the day before. I announced that I had promised the floor leader not to take too much time, and that I would not exceed one hour. I started a timer, then pulled out the PQ motion, laid it on my desk, and invited the other senators to come to my desk and sign it if they felt that the issue warranted such a drastic action. (The PQ motion has only been used twice since 2007.)

I stated that if I did not have the required five signatures (including mine) by the end of the hour, I would lay the bill over and sit down. But within 20 minutes, Senators Emery, Nasheed, Schaefer, Kehoe and Riddle had signed the PQ.

At that point, it became obvious that we would vote on the motion, and it forced negotiations to occur. I asked that we stand at ease, and several of us retired to the back room, and talked it out.

Ultimately, Senator Chapelle-Nadal was willing to allow the motion to be voted on, and without having to offer the PQ, and after Senators Holsman and Chapelle-Nadal spoke on the issue, the main motion passed 31-3, with Senators Chapelle-Nadal, Curls, and Keaveny voting no.

I could not have done this without the help of the senators above.

I specifically want to point out that Senator Holsman never actually said it was his intention to stop a vote on the motion. He even voted for it.

I also want to point out that it took a lot of courage for Senator Nasheed to sign the PQ. She told me she did not want it to appear that only republicans were against taking the pay increase. In the end, over half of the democrats supported the motion, proving that it was a bipartisan issue.

Also, Senator Kehoe at one point said that he would offer the PQ motion himself, which changed the dynamic of the discussion, and his doing that was critical. I doubt we would have gotten to a vote unless he had done that.

I know that I have brought a significant amount of negative regard by my fellow senators upon myself by 'flourishing' a PQ motion, as one reporter noted. This is a tool reserved for the end of session, and is usually done in private, after much agonizing discussion. But in my defense, I want to point out that for this particular motion, it was, in fact, 'the end of session', because the law required it be passed by Feb. 1.

Also, the issue is unique and personal; it was only about how much we ourselves are to be paid by the state. We all had a significant conflict of interest, and because of that, I felt that we shouldn't be allowed to hide behind "the tradition of the Senate" in this very unique case. Our conflicts of interest demanded that we 'man up' and publicly vote on such a huge pay increase for ourselves. And the only way to make that happen was to do what I did. But I know that it will likely come back to haunt me.

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