HB 218 -- PUBLIC SCHOOLS

CO-SPONSORS:  Farnen, Graham, Ridgeway, Reinhart

COMMITTEE ACTION:  Voted "do pass" by the Committee on
Education-Higher by a vote of 13 to 0.

This bill makes changes to several sections of law pertaining
primarily to higher education.  In its major provisions, the
bill:

(1)  Designates February as "Missouri Lifelong Learning Month";

(2)  Deletes an inaccurate reference to the faculty
representative to the University of Missouri curators;

(3)  Deletes the prohibition on the collection of tuition by the
University of Missouri;

(4)  Creates a program to promote research on spinal cord
injury, with a requirement that the curators request an
appropriation of no less than $200,000 each year; criteria for
proposal selection and the maximum size of awards are included
in the bill;

(5)  Sets up an advisory board, to be appointed by the
university curators, to solicit and select research proposals
for the Spinal Cord Injury Research Program; procedures
concerning peer review and the requirement for certain meetings
to be closed are detailed in the bill;

(6)  Creates a confidentiality requirement for governing boards
of the regional state colleges, Lincoln University, and Truman
State University; makes explicit the right of members of these
boards to recuse themselves; and permits board meetings to be
closed to student representatives;

(7)  Clarifies the powers of the student representative on the
board of Truman State University; and

(8)  Makes the powers, duties, and conditions of appointment for
the Lincoln University student representative consistent with
those of other institutions.

FISCAL NOTE:  Total Cost to General Revenue Fund could exceed
$220,000 in FY 2002, could exceed $226,600 in FY 2003, and could
exceed $233,398 in FY 2004.

PROPONENTS:  Supporters say that this is the same bill that was
truly agreed last year, minus the technical flaw that obligated
the Governor to veto it.  The spinal cord injury research
portion of the bill would be very valuable for those faced with
dealing with this situation.

Testifying for the bill were Representatives Farnen and Graham;
University of Missouri; Lucy Watts; Denise Bader; and William
Cody Bader.

OPPONENTS:  There was no opposition voiced to the committee.

Becky DeNeve, Senior Legislative Analyst

Missouri House of Representatives
Last Updated November 26, 2001 at 11:42 am