(Missourinet) – State Auditor Nicole Galloway tells Missourinet that she will seek re-election in 2018.

She was sworn into office as Missouri’s 37th State Auditor.

“When I first took on this job, I did state that I would be seeking re-election in 2018. Given the circumstances, I thought it was important to say that upfront,” says Galloway.

Galloway, a Democrat, was appointed in 2015 by Democratic Governor Jay Nixon after previous Auditor Tom Schweich, a Republican, committed suicide. Republicans criticized Nixon for handpicking someone from his own party.

“I wouldn’t have wanted this job if it wasn’t something that I was serious about and wanted to keep for a long period of time,” says Galloway.

Galloway is a former Boone County Treasurer.

(Missourinet) – A University of Missouri professor says Monday night’s debate will likely influence the outcome of the Presidential election.

M.U. Communications Professor Mitchell McKinney has been studying presidential debates since the late 1980s.  He advised the Commission on Presidential Debates in 1992, helping develop the “town hall” format.  And he’s conducted extensive research of each candidate’s debate performances in this year’s primaries.

McKinney thinks Donald Trump will have to change his approach from the earlier battles when he attacked his opponents as well as the moderators, and often seemed to say whatever was on his mind.

“We’re now at a point where I think some voters are expecting, does he have the ability to be more sober, serious, comport himself with a presidential demeanor,” said McKinney. “We’ve seen him, I think, more disciplined of late, even on the campaign trail. So I think that’s a challenge for Donald Trump in this debate.”

McKinney also says Trump will have to further develop his responses in a one-on-one setting, versus the primaries when ten candidate were on stage.

“We’re going to see, is there substance there. He really can’t sustain an entire debate with, sort of, a one liner with a humorous remark, with sometimes remarks that are really nothing more than self-praise.”

As far as Hillary Clinton goes, McKinney says she needs to avoid getting bogged down explaining scandals which have dogged her.

“If she spends the entire evening either based on a moderator, a journalist or her opponent calling her to account for emails, Benghazi, whatever the scandals, whatever the past actions, that’s going to put her very much on the defensive.”

McKinney thinks Clinton needs to work to try to change the perception she’d not trustworthy during the 90 minute event, which she won’t be able to do if she’s constantly dealing with the scandals surrounding her.

McKinney says the debate could influence the election’s outcome because there’s still a large number of undecided voters, and because the race has gotten tighter in the past couple of weeks.

“If this race remains as tight as it is now, certainly trying to reach a segment of those undecideds could tip the balance.”

Polls show undecided voters compose between 3 and 10 percent of the electorate.

McKinney says his historical research points to Monday’s debate being consequential November’s outcome.

“In my previous analysis I’ve found that debates were influential in other close presidential contests, including the elections of 1960, 1976, 1980 and 2000.”

Monday’s debate is the first of three scheduled presidential face-offs between Clinton and Trump.  It’ll take place at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York, just outside New York City.

The 2nd debate scheduled for October 9th at Washington University in St. Louis will be conducted in the “town hall” format, which McKinney was instrumental in introducing in 1992.

(Missourinet) – Columbia could join Saint Louis County and other local governments by starting its own database that checks how many prescriptions people are having filled.
City Councilman Michael Trapp says it’s too easy to cheat the system.

“[You can] go from doctor to doctor to doctor and tell each of them about your back pain, and walk out of each of them with a pain pill prescription, and then be at dangerous levels of a very dangerous medication without anyone being the wiser.”

Missouri is the only state in the country without a prescription drug monitoring program.

Trapp says the database would cost Columbia about $12,000-$13,000 a year, after some startup costs. He adds it’s not about throwing people in jail.

“If there’s been a rapid number of prescription refills, then the medical professionals need to know about that, and that needs to be addressed like a medical problem.”

Missouri is the only state in the country without a prescription drug monitoring program. State Representative Holly Rehder (R-Sikeston) has sponsored a bi-partisan bill in the legislature to create such a program, but strong opposition from state senator Rob Schaaf (R-St. Joseph) has kept the bill from moving forward.

(Missourinet) – An endangered person advisory has been issued for a missing 13-year-old southern Missouri girl.

The Dent County Sheriff’s office says Harley Hopper was last seen early Thursday morning in Salem. She is believed to be traveling with 22-year-old Kenneth Dylan Whitehead in a white older model GMC full size pickup with unknown license plates.

Hopper reportedly left her residence overnight with a backpack, entered the suspect’s vehicle and has not been seen since.

Hopper is described as a white female, age 13, 5’3” tall, weighing approximately 220 lbs., with black hair, blue eyes and a fair complexion. She was seen wearing a blue striped shirt, blue jeans and cowboy boots.

Whitehead is described as a white male, age 22, 5’06” tall, weighing approximately 187 lbs., with brown hair and green eyes. Whitehead could possibly have ties to the Sullivan area or the state of Ohio.

Anyone seeing the missing person, suspect, vehicle, or other important information should immediately call 911 or call the Dent County Sheriff’s Office at 573-729-3757.

(Missourinet) – A medical marijuana proposal will not be on Missouri’s general election ballot in November.

Cole County Circuit Judge Daniel Green has ruled against overturning petition signatures that have been considered invalid.

Local election authorities denied about 10,700 signatures collected from a group called New Approach Missouri. The group needed about 2,200 signatures overturned in order to gain ballot access. New Approach Missouri says Judge Green wanted to require that all signatures appear on a sheet that lists the signer’s correct county in the upper right-hand corner.

The measure would have asked Missourians if physicians should be able to recommend medical marijuana for patients battling illnesses like cancer, Alzheimer’s, epilepsy and PTSD.

It included a 4% tax on marijuana to help fund veteran healthcare services. The State Auditor’s office estimates that the tax could have generated about $20 million annually.

Some medical marijuana opponents say the true intent of the measure is to legalize marijuana for recreational use.

There are 25 states that have medical marijuana laws.

(Missourinet) – One Missouri community has taken the issue of poverty to the national stage.

Earlier this week, the Springfield City Council decided to send a letter to a federal agency asking for more robust oversight of payday lenders.  The city identified payday loans as one of several major contributors to poverty which needs to be addressed on a higher level.

Springfield City Manager Greg Burris said the designation was made by its 35 member “Impacting Poverty Commission.”

“That’s just one a number of different policy issues at the state and national level that we think needs to be fixed before we can really allow people to get out of poverty.”

The commission also pegged Medicaid expansion, food access and child obesity as major issues which policymakers on the state and national level need to address.

Burris said another gaping problem is a phenomenon called the “cliff effect,” where people working their way up lose government subsidized benefits when they reach a certain pay grade.

“If you’re getting a daycare subsidy, and you’re working your way up through the organization, and you’re due for a raise, and you’ve earned a raise, but then you have to say ‘I can’t accept that raise’ because if you accept that additional one dollar an hour, you’ll lose you childcare. That’s just one of a number of different policy level issues at the state and national level that we think needs to be fixed before we can really allow people to get out of poverty.”

Burris said expansion of Medicaid benefits would go a long way in alleviating poverty at the local level, but he’s not sure state lawmakers are open to such a move.  Republican dominated state legislatures across the country have been resistant to Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act.  Missouri has GOP super-majorities in both its state Senate and House.

Springfield has also received national recognition for its attention to poverty.  Burris said noted Harvard sociologist Doctor Robert Putnam praised the community for tackling poverty head-on.

“He’s been to 140 communities in the last year,” said Burris.  “His quote was, he hasn’t found a city in the country that has a more sophisticated understanding of these issues than Springfield, Missouri.”

The city has also been applauded by the National Resource Network for its attention to poverty issues.

(Missourinet) – According to a University of Missouri study, families who rely on assistance through the WIC nutritional program experience a 5 to 11% increase in hunger when a child turns five.

Dr. Colleen Heflin with the Truman School of Public Affairs says eligibility ends at age five.

“There’s a very straightforward policy solution here and that’s for the federal government to extend eligibility for the WIC program to the point when children actually enter kindergarten,” says Heflin.

The study does not cover what the cost would be to implement this change, but Heflin says the investment would be worth it.

“The Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program is not a very expensive program. The value of the basket of food that the children receive by the time they are in their final years is much smaller than, say, the SNAP program. It’s a basket of nutrition-dense food and I think it’s widely considered to be one of the most successful programs that mutes any benefit cost analysis,” says Heflin.

Another MU study says the percentage of Missouri families experiencing hunger has more than doubled in the last decade.

A USDA report ranks Missouri second highest in the nation for people lacking food. The most recent figures say about 840,000 Missourians receive food stamps.