Says State Senators Schaaf, Emery, Kraus are Blocking Progress in Missouri

Florissant Mayor Thomas P. Schneider, who alreadly requested that Gov. Nixon call a special legislative session to pass a 2-cent state gas tax increase, is urging all candidates for governor in 2016 to support the gas tax increase. Such an increase is needed to avoid forfeiting hundreds of millions of dollars in federal matching funds for Missouri transportation. Without this financing the state’s roads will deteriorate and its bridges will collapse.

“Missouri needs a dollar to match every four dollars of federal highway money or our state loses our share,” said Schneider. “It is my hope that Governor Nixon and all announced 2016 gubernatorial candidates will join me and other Missouri officials and professionals to demand that the Missouri Legislature not throw Missourians under the bus.

“Governor Nixon expressed his support for this critically needed, 2-cent fuel tax increase and the work and jobs that come with it at the end of the 2015 legislative session,” added Schneider. “What is difficult to understand is why our state legislature allows itself to be road-blocked by state senator Rob Schaaf (R-St. Joseph), state senator Ed Emery (R-Lamar) and state senator Will Kraus (R-Lee’s Summit). These filibusterers cling to a narrow-minded, no-tax-for-anything-for-any-reason dogma and risk forfeiting more than $200 million of urgently needed matching federal funds for our Missouri roads and bridges.”

“There is no good reason for such reckless and short-sighted foot-dragging,” said Schneider. “Now we are asking our Missouri Legislature to address this critical issue and take care of our state’s infrastructure. We have come to a fork in the road of progress. If we don’t understand the urgency and act appropriately it will become a fork for two bumpy roads going nowhere.”

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