JEFFERSON CITY | Dealing with everything from guns and hunting to health care and marriage, more than 100 new laws took effect Tuesday in Missouri.
Among the new laws:
•GUN RIGHTS (S.B. 62): Missouri residents no longer have a duty to retreat before using deadly force against a person who illegally enters a vehicle, a home or any structure designed for overnight occupancy. Missourians also no longer must obtain permits from their sheriffs before buying concealable handguns, although permits still will be required to carry guns.
•MEDICAID OVERHAUL (S.B. 577): Missouri’s revamped Medicaid program now emphasizes primary care. A pilot program subsidizes health insurance for low-income workers without medical coverage. Women’s health services will be expanded to add 90,000 low- and moderate-income residents, Medicaid coverage is restored to about 3,200 disabled workers, and former foster children can keep Medicaid coverage until they turn 21. More than 20,000 additional children are eligible for the Children’s Health Insurance Program.
•HIGHER EDUCATION (S.B. 389): New limits are imposed on university tuition, need-based scholarships are expanded, and the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority is authorized to transfer $350 million to the state over the next 6 1/2 years. The money is earmarked for construction projects at state universities, community colleges and agriculture extension stations.
•HEALTH MATTERS (H.B. 818): Residents can keep their health insurance when they change jobs. They can deduct the cost of health insurance from their income taxes, and self-employed workers get a tax credit for health-insurance premiums paid. People with chronic health problems now qualify for lower-cost medical insurance. Parents will be able to keep children on their health insurance policies until the children turn 25. Hospitals, doctors and other medical providers who claim they are owed money will be allowed to intercept the patient’s income tax return to collect the debt. Women who receive a prenatal test that shows the fetus might have Down syndrome or other abnormalities will be referred to programs encouraging alternatives to abortion.
•MARRIAGE LICENSES (S.B. 22): Couples no longer face a three-day waiting period before receiving marriage licenses.
•CABLE SERVICES (S.B. 284): Telephone companies can compete more easily with cable TV companies because they no longer are required to negotiate a video services franchise with every community. Now, phone and cable TV companies can get a statewide franchise for video services.
•KANSAS CITY SCHOOLS BREAKWAY (S.B. 112): The measure makes it easier for seven schools in Independence to leave the Kansas City School District and join the Independence district. If voters in the Kansas City School District vote against letting the Independence schools leave, the new law requires the state to approve the move as long as Kansas City is unaccredited on its most recent yearly performance review.
•TAX CUT FOR SENIORS/TAX INCREASE FOR KANSANS (H.B. 444): It phases in over six years a $153.8 million tax cut on Social Security benefits and certain other retirement income. Individuals with income of more than $80,000 a year and couples with combined incomes of more than $100,000 a year would see a smaller benefit from the tax cut. The measure, however, also enacts a tax hike on many Kansans who work in Missouri by no longer allowing them to deduct their Kansas property taxes from their Missouri income taxes. •NURSING-HOME SPRINKLERS (H.B. 952): Residential facilities, including nursing homes and many assisted-living centers, licensed on or after Tuesday must have sprinkler systems. Residential facilities already licensed would have to install sprinklers by 2013.
•SELLING DRUGS NEAR A PARK (S.B. 198): Selling heroin, cocaine, LSD, amphetamine or methamphetamine within 1,000 feet of a park is a Class A felony, punishable by 10-30 years or life in prison. Critics of the measure said it will hit offenders in cities harder because there is a greater concentration of parks than in suburban or rural areas.
•HUNTING (S.B. 225): The 100-year floodplains of the Missouri and Mississippi rivers now are designated as hunting heritage areas where shooting for hunting or sport cannot be prohibited. Exemptions are property within Kansas City and St. Louis, areas designated as urbanized in the 2000 census or land within a half-mile of an interstate highway.
•FAITH-BASED ORGANIZATIONS (S.B. 46): The Social Services Department is required to assign staff members who will promote faith-based organizations as providers of local social services in each region of the state.
• EXECUTION TEAM (H.B. 820): A current or former member of the team of people who carry out executions for the state can sue news operations that disclose their identities. The measure was in response to the case of a surgeon in charge of supervising lethal injections for the state who was identified in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Lawmakers also found time to name the three-toed box turtle the official state reptile, the crayfish the official state invertebrate, Big Bluestem the official state grass and bobwhite quail the official state game bird.
For the complete text of new legislation, go to www.moga.state.mo.us and click on “Truly Agreed/Finally Passed.”
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