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Nixon hammers home flaws in tax-cut bill; seed vault tour

Kristofor Husted
/
KBIA file photo

Gov. Jay Nixon stopped by Columbia twice this week. He has spent his summer drawing attention to the many problems he and other critics see with House Bill 253. That is the income-tax cut bill he vetoed in June. There is a chance state Republicans could make a run for an override of that bill in September. The bill cuts income tax and corporate taxes and under certain circumstances allows business taxes to be claimed on personal income taxes. Conservative estimates peg a state revenue loss of $692 million dollars if the bill were to become law. Other estimates put in upwards of 800 million.

While visiting the MU campus Wednesday, Nixon directly addressed the GOP lawmakers who have pointed to Kansas as a model for cutting taxes and reinvigorating business and the economy.

Republican House Speaker Tim Jones has stated to several media outlets that it will be difficult to get the votes to override the veto. Next week the Republican caucus will meet and discuss the issue.

A study by the Pew Charitable Trusts shows that Missouri is in the top ten states when it comes to using cost-benefit analysis of taxpayer money.  Jennifer Davidson has details.

When genetically modified wheat was found growing in Oregon earlier this year, it didn’t take long for accusations to start flying. No one knew how the unapproved wheat ended up in the ground. A flurry of finger-pointing casts potential blame on a federal seed vault in Colorado, which housed the same strain of wheat.

The facility's been cleared of wrongdoing since then. But the investigation brings up questions of how secure these seed vaults actually are. Harvest Public Media’s Luke Runyon took a tour of the Colorado vault, and filed this report.

Kristofor left KBIA in fall of 2021