Senate bill could cost local libraries

A bill in the perfecting stage in the Missouri Senate appears to put several area civic groups at a loss. But those groups’ organizers say the bill might be a blessing in disguise.
Part of the state funding for groups such as the Springfield-Greene County Library District and Ozarks Public Television comes from taxes on nonresident entertainers and professional athletes who work in Missouri. Senate Bill 269, proposed by Republican Sen. Charlie Shields of St. Joseph, would change the funding formula, sending 60 percent of the tax fund to renovation and maintenance of professional sports stadiums in Kansas City and St. Louis.
The new bill would annually allocate approximately $14.4 million of the entertainer and athlete fund for the sports authorities in Jackson County, for improvements to Arrowhead and Kauffman stadiums, and St. Louis, to pay down the debt service on the Edward Jones Dome. A small percentage of the fund – 4 percent – would be split among the sports authorities in Springfield, Joplin, Branson and St. Charles County.
Meanwhile, the bill cuts funding for the Missouri Arts Council – from 60 percent of the fund’s revenue to 24 percent – as well as for four other cultural partners – the humanities council trust fund, the state library networking fund, the public television broadcasting corporation fund and the state historic preservation fund – from 10 percent to 4 percent.
Gov. Matt Blunt’s fiscal year 2006 budget summary estimates $24 million in the fund, meaning the arts council would get approximately $5.8 million while the other four groups would receive just less than $1 million.
The blessing: that might be new money for the agencies.
Springfield-Greene County Library District Executive Director Annie Busch said the money spelled out in current law has not been properly appropriated since it was created, and nothing has been appropriated for the last two or three years. While Busch is not in favor of the bill in light of Missouri’s budget picture, she said the bill’s proponents are arguing that “4 percent of something is better than 10 percent of nothing.”
Beverly Strohmeyer, interim executive director of the Missouri Arts Council, is one of those proponents. She said the new bill could actually mean more money for her organizations and the other cultural partners.
“We were supposed to be getting 60 percent (of the nonresident entertainers fund), up to a maximum of $10 million a year, and the last three years we’ve gotten zero,” she said. “So if we get 24 percent, which is what the new bill represents, then it’s more than we’ve been getting, and it’s for a longer period of time.”
Her opinion is that Shields feels that the sports authorities represent a much stronger partnership than the cultural partners, which could help ensure that the appropriations are properly followed.
Busch said there are several problems with the bill.
“It’s an earmark tax that would again take money out of general revenue and leave even less discretionary income for the state, and you know what kind of trouble they’re having funding even the basic services right now,” she said. “This would push them to take another $32 million out of the pot. Even if you like the bill, which I don’t, now is not the time to do it.”
At press time, the bill was under the Senate Government Accountability and Fiscal Oversight Committee’s review.