(Missourinet) – ESPN teamed up with Marvel Comics to create comic book versions to honor 25 athletes and influencers, including Senator Claire McCaskill (D-Missouri), who have made the greatest impact for women in sports. In the comic, McCaskill, alongside her colleague Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-New York), are called “Senators of Steel”. McCaskill and Gillibrand are praised by ESPNw’s “Impact 25” series for their work to curb sexual assaults on college campuses.

Senators Gillibrand and McCaskill co-sponsored the Campus Accountability and Safety Act, which would strengthen sexual assault policies by universities. The bill would require schools to have a uniform process for dealing with assaults and to survey their students regularly, making their findings public.

“Right now, some colleges and universities are more inclined to expel a student for cheating on an exam than for committing sexual assault,” said Gillibrand.

According to the 2014 McCaskill Report, when a case involves an athlete, more than 20% of schools allow their athletic departments to investigate and resolve the incident from within.

According to the National Institute of Justice, one in five women on college campuses has been sexually assaulted. But McCaskill said many occurrences – if they are even reported to authorities – are often kept behind closed doors, even as federal law requires that colleges and universities be forthcoming about all types of violent crime on their campuses.

(Missourinet) – Two of Missouri’s Republican candidates used their latest forum appearances to criticize the response to recent protests at the University of Missouri.

During the Missouri Farm Bureau’s forum featuring all five gubernatorial candidates, Former House Speaker and U.S. Attorney Catherine Hanaway was asked how she would foster collaboration between universities in Missouri with ag programs.

“The first thing I want to do is clean up the lawlessness at the University of Missouri,” said Hanaway.

She said cited a speech by Ronald Reagan on the issue of campus protests over the Vietnam War in which she said he said, “Teachers who are paid to teach should teach, students should go to class, and athletes who are given scholarships should play.”

“I think the governor ought to be there,” Hanaway continued. “And if the curators that you’ve appointed aren’t making sure that those things happen, then perhaps you should have a conversation with them about why you still want to be a curator.”

Lieutenant Governor Peter Kinder accused the governor and University leadership of failing to lead during those protest.

“I was looking for university leadership and a head coach who would say, ‘There are no strikes on our football team. You are privileged athletes with a scholarship, and free room and board, and free tuition, and the best meals on campus in the dining hall. In exchange for that we expect you to suit up and if you don’t you have jeopardized your scholarship,’” said Kinder.

Both their remarks were met with applause by the Farm Bureau crowd.

Kinder followed up on his statements after the forum, criticizing Governor Jay Nixon (D) for not going to the University during the protests.

“I would have gone on campus … I would have listened to the demonstrators – they have a right to be heard,” said Kinder. “But they do not govern the university. The students don’t govern the university and the faculty don’t govern the university. The board of curators does.”

(Missourinet) – Governor Jay Nixon has issued an executive order for state agencies to use guidelines meant to ensure equal pay for men and women. The guidelines, developed by the Women’s Foundation and the University of Missouri Institute of Public Policy, call for identifying and addressing any gender wage gap and providing Missourians with equal pay for equal work.

“Shortchanging 50% of the workforce is bad for women, it’s bad for families, and it’s bad for our entire economy,” said Nixon.

Women’s Foundation President and CEO Wendy Doyle is pleased that Nixon issued the executive order.

“We just want to continue to draw awareness to the fact that, we as a state, are well behind the national average which is 78 cents to the dollar that men make,” said Doyle. “As a state, there is still a tremendous amount of work that needs to be done.”

Missouri’s female workers earn 71% of what men earn and Doyle wants the state to come closer to the national average.

Doyle said retail, manufacturing, healthcare and education have the largest gender pay gaps while professional setting jobs, like physicians, have less pay inequality. Doyle also said the gap is noticed more in smaller cities than in Missouri’s metropolitan areas.

“As women, something we can do is take some personal responsibility and don’t hold back, have that confidence to reach out and ask for that pay raise or in salary negotiations to take a job,” said Doyle.

Nixon is also encouraging private businesses to use the guidelines.

(Missourinet) – More Missouri religious groups are calling for Syrian refugees to be welcomed into Missouri and the U.S., and accuse lawmakers and candidates who have called for a halt to refugees’ entrance of reacting to and spreading fear.

Reverend John Bennett with the Disciples of Christ says that call by those politicians isn’t the only sentiment in Missouri.

“We want a different narrative to be heard versus a narrative of fear,” said Bennett. “We would like our legislators to set the moral tone in terms of visionary leadership that looks at the big picture rather than the immediate, knee-jerk reaction.”

Millersburg minister Larry Brown has been an active supporter of Church World Service, which helps refugees. He said people of faith are called to help those in need.

“I have found myself in the position just recently in worship service where I attend having to stand up and say, ‘Well I don’t know about you, but I’m going to make my home open to any refugees that want to come,’” said Brown at a gathering Thursday morning at the Capitol.

David Finke with the Mid-Missouri Fellowship of Reconciliation wants federal lawmakers to block passage of legislation to restrict refugees.

“The bill that was passed – I would say to our shame – by the [U.S.] House of Representatives is pending in the Senate, so if you ask what do we call for, we call for the Senate to reject that bill,” said Finke.

Mike Hoey with the Missouri Catholic Conference, who recently spoke to Missourinet about the refugee issue and said one of the Conference’s priorities is that the state legislature not stop the appropriation of federal funds to refugee assistance programs.

Hoey said these refugees are fleeing horrible conditions.

“If we close our doors to these refugees, ISIS wins. We let them define who we are,” said Hoey. “This is a defining moment four our country. Will we save the people fleeing ISIS or will we close the doors to these refugees? France has made their decision. They’re going to take in the refugees even after that terrible attack.”

Some lawmakers and candidates say the federal and UN vetting processes might not be touch enough to weed out possible terrorists who might try to sneak into the country among refugees. Senator Kurt Schaefer (R-Columbia) at a hearing Monday defended a joint session of the House and Senate budget committees related to the refugee issue.

“No one should imply that somehow due diligence on what this process is and how dollars are being spent is somehow mean-spirited or xenophobia, or something we shouldn’t even talk about,” said Schaefer.

(Missourinet) – A disease that threatens the state’s deer population has been found in a fourth Missouri county.

The latest deer to test positive for Chronic Wasting Disease was shot by a hunter in Franklin County, just west of St. Louis. Since 2012 the disease has also been found in free-ranging deer from Adair and Macon counties in northeast Missouri, and in central Missouri’s Cole County. As of June, CWD had been found in 26 free-ranging deer and 11 captive deer.

The disease causes the degeneration of brain tissue in deer and other members of the deer family, slowly leading to death. The disease has no vaccine or cure and is 100-percent fatal to cervids. Research is still being done on whether the disease poses any threat to humans. As of 2014 there is no evidence humans can be infected with CWD.

The Conservation Department does not expect short-term deer population impacts from CWD, but said research from other states where the disease has been found shows it can have serious long-term consequences on the health of a state’s deer herd.

The discovery in Adair, Macon, and Cole counties of CWD triggered the creation of “CWD management zones” in 19 counties including and surrounding those. Special regulations and guidelines were enforced in those counties governing the use of deer attractants, the moving of carcasses and meat, and hunting regulations.

The Department has not said whether such special enforcement efforts could be enacted in and around Franklin County.

(Missourinet) – Proposals to let law enforcement pull people over for not wearing a seatbelt, and to ban texting while driving for everyone, have been offered for the legislature to consider.

Law enforcement in Missouri can only ticket someone for not wearing a seatbelt after stopping that person for another offense, and Missouri law only makes texting while driving illegal for those 21 or younger and commercial drivers.

Representative Nate Walker (R-Kirksville) proposes a primary seatbelt law – that would let law enforcement stop people just for not wearing a seatbelt, and banning texting while driving for everyone.

Walker, whose among other things is a former director of the Missouri Division of Highway Safety, says both bills would address growing problems.

“I just notice when I drive up and down the road … more and more people tend to be not focusing on driving and apparently are looking at their electronic device, whether it be a phone or something else, and it appears that they are texting while they’re driving. I notice a lot of cars that are weaving around,” said Walker. “Also fatalities this year have been on the increase and [the Department of Transportation] and the Highway Patrol have attributed people not wearing their safety devices as often.”

The Highway Patrol reports in fatal crashes this year involving individuals who by law should be restrained, 63 percent of those were people who were not restrained at the time of the crash. It says in 2014, six people died in 351 accidents attributed to someone texting or e-mailing while driving. 157 more people were injured.

Both proposals have the backing of the state Highways and Transportation Commission. Chairman Stephen Miller told Missourinet, “We think that both of those measures have proven in other areas of the United States to make a difference in highway fatalities.”

The primary seatbelt law is not without its opponents, however. One of Walker’s fellow Republicans, Representative Jay Barnes (Jefferson City) doesn’t like the idea.

“I don’t support providing probable cause to stop people just because they’re not wearing a seatbelt, if they’re otherwise obeying the law,” said Barnes.

Some Missouri cities have enacted bans on texting while driving and at least one – Osage Beach – is considering its own primary seatbelt law.

(Missourinet) – Representative Genise Montecillo (D-St. Louis) believes Governor Jay Nixon (D) has been dodging lawmakers’ questions about his plan for the state to help pay for a new football stadium in St. Louis. She told Nixon’s Office of Administration Commissioner, Doug Nelson, she doesn’t like the idea of extending the debt on the bonds that paid for the Rams stadium.

“We continue to be met with a stone wall or brick wall, if you will, to our questions. It’s always I don’t know. I don’t have that information. I haven’t talked to these people. I don’t know what they’re going to do. We don’t know if they’re going to move. We don’t know if we’re going to have a football team. You’re asking the people to foot the bill of a very expensive stadium for a lot of unknowns. That seems to continue to be the position that you’re putting this budget committee in,” said Monticello.

“Well, I’m only going to tell you is what I know,” said Nelson.

“It’s unfortunate from my perspective anyway, that we continue to be in this adversarial position,” said Monticello. “The Governor sends people who conveniently can’t answer our questions or they conveniently don’t know. That’s not acceptable.”

“What I can tell you is a question that we’ve been asked that I have looked at and given my legal opinion. I think under Chapter 67, the Legislative branch gave the Executive branch the authority that we’re going to look at whether or not we’re going to exercise that authority,” said Nelson.

Nelson maintains that Nixon has the legal authority to extend the debt on those bonds but the Legislature has the authority to amend it.
Governor Nixon wants to build a new stadium but critics say the Rams’ future in St. Louis is uncertain and no agreements have been made to bring another team to St. Louis if they leave.

Numerous lawmakers have said they would oppose paying the debt on those bonds if they are extended, though the constitution requires state debt be paid.

(Missourinet) – Democrats question the need for and purpose of a legislative hearing on refugee screening and assistance. Republicans say they’re answering Missourians’ concerns.

A joint hearing of the Republican-led House and Senate’s budget committees asked state agencies what kind of assistance refugees get and how the state keeps tabs on federal assessments of refugees to check for radicals.

Senator Jamilah Nasheed (D-St. Louis) accused Republican counterparts of ignoring greater domestic threats while trying to score political points.

“I think that what we’re seeing right now is individuals pandering to their base on the backs of those individuals who are trying to flee oppression,” said Nasheed.

She said the hearing was not really about fighting terrorism.

“Friday we just had a terrorist attack in America, and nobody is having a conversation … the fear mongers amongst us are here.”

Senator Kurt Schaefer (R-Columbia) says Missourians want to know that refugees are thoroughly vetted to keep terrorists from entering Missouri among them.

“You screwed up a lot of other stuff, federal government. What are you doing on this one? Because you know what? You get one wrong and you’re going to end up with citizens who get killed. Maybe many,” said Schaefer. “No one should imply that somehow due diligence on what this process is and how dollars are being spent is somehow mean-spirited or xenophobia, or something we shouldn’t even talk about.”

Representative Genise Montecillo (D-St. Louis) thinks lawmakers who want to stop Syrian refugees from coming to Missouri, if only temporarily, are sending the wrong message to Missourians.

“Some among us almost seem to be validating the concern or heightening the concern when we should be showing calm and reassuring our constituents to make sure that yes, we are making sure that you’re safe but we’re also being compassionate people,” said Montecillo.

The committee learned 29 Syrian refugees have come to Missouri this year. Between 900 and 1,500 settle in the state annually. It was also told refugees go through several screenings often beginning before entering the U.S., and continued by the federal government. The process can take between 18 and 24 months.