(Missourinet) – Jeff Mizanskey will present his case for why he should be paroled during a hearing Thursday. He is the only man sentenced to life without parole for marijuana possession and distribution under a persistent offender sentencing law from the 1990s that has since been changed.

Mizanskey has been in prison for more than two decades and says parole is not a right, it’s a privilege.

“There are a lot of different feelings going right now. All I can do is hope for the best and plan for the worst,” says Mizanskey.

Mizanskey says 21 years in prison is long enough for a non-violent crime.

“There are people who do belong in prison, don’t get me wrong,” says Mizanskey. “But, most of them deserve a chance at parole. I think I’m one of those who deserves a chance.”
Mizanskey talks about what he’s learned in more than two decades in prison.

“From what I see, a lot of people in the world need help and a lot of them aren’t getting it. They’re getting put in here and the keys are getting thrown away and they’re locked up,” says Mizanskey.
Those who argue Mizanskey should be let out of prison note that in his 21 years inside, he has been written up only twice: once for having a dirty cell, and once for putting a piece of mail in the wrong box.

A petition with nearly 400,000 signatures was delivered to Governor Nixon in April asking for clemency for Mizanskey and in May the Governor commuted his sentence, giving him his first chance at parole. The signatures of 128 legislators were among those on the petition.

After the hearing is complete the parole board will make a decision on his fate.

(Missourinet) – The state House Republican caucus has had its first look at what changes might be made to the chamber’s intern policy after the scandal involving its former House Speaker and a college intern.

Representative Kevin Engler (R-Farmington) heads up a panel looking at the state House’s policy regarding college interns after former House Speaker John Diehl, Junior admitted to exchanging sexually suggestive texts with an intern and resigned at the end of the last session.

Engler says possible changes were outlined in a report to the closed-door summer caucus of House Republicans, last week.

“We’re going to have some electronic communications standards, restrictions, and protocols, and we’re going to have some personal responsibilities of actions that are unacceptable,” Engler told Missourinet. “We’re going to have a better ombudsman program, we’re going to have an orientation program that all the representatives and the interns will have to go through and sign off on, and a couple other details that we’re trying to do to make sure there’s some accountability without letting the pendulum swing too far the other way and making it so restrictive that nobody can ever come to the Capitol and do an internship.”

Engler thinks the policy regarding communication between interns and lawmakers should be very restrictive.

“It’s unacceptable in a business environment to be having personal comments on e-mails or texts, and I don’t think that’s anything that shouldn’t be at least adhered to in the professional setting of the legislature,” said Engler. “I think that the communication should be a business nature and a legislative nature and nothing of a personal nature.”

He said one recommendation is that a committee be formed to oversee interns who aren’t tied to a college.

“There are a lot of interns in the building that aren’t students, but for one reason or another they’re interning,” said Engler, “and members wanted to have the flexibility of using some of those interns, but we have to have some accountability measures.”

The report that was shown to the House Republican caucus is now being shown to House Democrats. He says it’s not being made public yet.

“We’re just getting feedback but I imagine some details will come out at some point,” said Engler.

(Missourinet) – The title of a Senate Interim Committee is of concern to Senator Jill Schupp (D-St. Louis). She’s a member of the ‘Sanctity of Life’ committee and says she hopes the true intent is to make sure there are no laws being broken in this state by Planned Parenthood. It is investigating whether Planned Parenthood in Missouri has profited from selling fetal organs, based on allegations raised by the release of several undercover videos.

“By calling this the committee on the ‘Sanctity of Life’, I feel like we’re starting from a place that doesn’t feel impartial to me and I want to make sure that if we are going to do this investigation, this is not a witch hunt,” said Schupp. “Planned Parenthood does a lot of good things in the state of Missouri and throughout the country and I don’t want this to be a witch hunt because somebody doesn’t like the issue or is opposed to the idea of abortion.”

Schupp told Missourinet she hopes politics can be set aside.

“Senator Schaefer may be choosing to prolong this for his own personal or political reasons. I just don’t know,” says Schupp. “I don’t think this needs to be a long term process.”
The committee was formed shortly after several videos surfaced that some say discuss the illegal selling of fetal organs.

(Missourinet) – The leader of the Missouri Senate is preparing to move back into private life, and his majority Republican party is preparing to carry on without him.

Missouri Senate President Tom Dempsey (R-St. Charles) will resign at the end of this week to pursue a job in the private sector. He informed Majority Leader Ron Richard (R-Joplin) of his decision, and the two discussed what policies the caucus will pursue after Dempsey leaves. Richard doesn’t think Dempsey’s departure will drastically change how the chamber operates.

“We’ve decided policies on a consensus and pushed forward on our agenda items by consensus, so not any one person in the Senate is pressed upon everybody else,” Richard told Missourinet.
Still, he says losing Dempsey means the Senate is losing an important strategist and negotiator.

“He is good at bringing both sides together and thinking through the issues and not losing his temper and working with members regardless of what he though about their item or their legislation,” said Richard. “He’ll be missed. Diplomats like that are rare, and we’ll try to just forge ahead.”

Two other lawmakers have resigned in recent months amid scandals involving interns, but Richard says noone should suspect anything like that is behind Dempsey’s resignation.

“No, no, no. Tom’s the most straight, upright, decent human being I’ve ever met. That’s not the case. I think he’s got just some other job opportunities in St. Charles,” said Richard.

The Senate could elect a new leader when it convenes for the veto session in September. Richard spent the weekend contacting fellow senators seeking their support, as he intends to run to succeed Dempsey.

Dempsey’s resignation means both chambers will begin 2016 with different leaders from those they started the 2015 session with. House Speaker John Diehl, Junior, resigned on the final day of the session after admitting to exchanging sexually suggestive texts with a college intern. The House then elected Todd Richardson (R-Poplar Bluff) to the Speaker’s position.

(Missourinet) – The Republican elected by his peers to steer debate in the state House expects to deal with three key issues in 2016.

Lee’s Summit representative Mike Cierpiot was elected by House Republicans to serve as Majority Floor Leader, meaning he will choose what bills are brought up on the floor for debate and for how long.

Cierpiot says his own legislative agenda during his five years in the House has been very light.

“I play defense as much as anything down there,” Cierpiot told Missourinet, “but I know next year we’re going to look at ethics, try to get an ethics law done, as far as the revolving door, and the gift ban and things like that. We made an attempt at it this year but there was some disagreement between the House and the Senate.”

He also expects discussion of how to fund maintenance of and additions to Missouri’s transportation infrastructure.

“I know the revenues from the gas sales is up and so the hurry is kind of removed, but I think it’s going to be looked at again for a long-term fix,” said Cierpiot.

He also hopes the legislature can pass a voter photo ID proposal in 2016. The House again succeeded in sending the Senate legislation on that issue this year, but it did not reach the Senate floor for debate.

“It’s something Republicans have wanted to do for a long time. It’s something that unites our caucus, and I’m hoping we can give it a high priority next year,” said Cierpiot.
Cierpiot also said he would work with Democrats on their priorities, but said it, “depends on what the issue is. There are some things that they want that we don’t want, and that’s just the way it is with Republicans and Democrats right now.”

“Some of the things like Medicaid expansion … I think has a very small chance of getting much light, but there are other issues I think we can work together on. I look forward to that,” said Cierpiot.

One priority for Democrats is a law to prevent discrimination against LGBT individuals in employment and housing. Cierpiot said he would have to see what can reach him out of the committee process.

“If it gets through the committee process I’ll certain look at it and talk to some people and see,” said Cierpiot. “It’s really hard to predict how a bill will be handled until you see the actual way it’s drawn up.”

Cierpiot had planned to run for floor leader in 2016 anyway, but the position came open at the end of this year’s session when then-Majority Floor Leader Todd Richardson was elected by his caucus to be House Speaker. Richardson replaced John Diehl, Junior, who resigned after admitting to sharing sexually-suggestive text messages with a college intern.

Cierpiot hopes his election is another step toward getting the caucus back on track following that controversy.

“I was a big fan of John. He was a very talented guy. I, of course, was disappointed with what happened. I think with John resigning we got it behind us pretty quickly,” said Cierpiot.

(Missourinet)- Missouri law will in 2017 require that insurance companies cover specific mental health treatments associated with eating disorders. The new legislation will put Missouri ahead of other states in fighting such diseases.

Now advocates like Miss America 2008, Kirsten Haglund, hope people will take advantage of it, and that can mean overcoming stigma.

“Stigma is one of the biggest non-tangible barriers to treatment,” says Haglund.

Other times, Haglund says, it can take a friend or family member recognizing an eating disorder and confronting the sufferer.

“I think it’s hard and there’s a lot of denial and frustration,” says Haglund. The people around that person need to have courage in confronting them and maybe they need to have conversations with that person multiple times before they want to get better.”

Rick Stream pushed for the law for seven of his years in the state House.

“We’ve given the tools now to the families and kids to get treatment and we hope that they’ll take them and use them,” says Stream.

He says he hopes people will take advantage of the new law, and he also talks about the stigma associated with eating disorders.

“Nobody wants admit they’ve got an addiction. Nobody wants to admit that they are doing this to their body. Anorexia and bulimia are not a natural thing,” says Stream.

Stream’s daughter, Katie, died while fighting bulimia in 1995.

(Missourinet) – Missouri is following the national trend of increased home sales with a continued jump by nearly 20% compared to June 2014. In the second quarter, there was a 23% increase in national home sales.

Missouri Relators Association CEO John Sebree says homes are selling faster than previous years.

“The number of days homes are on the market has fallen 7.4% compared to June 2014,” says Sebree.

Sebree says there has been a very diverse group of home buyers this year, with some people downsizing and others moving from their starter homes to bigger properties in order to accommodate growing families.