Left by the wayside is a request by the Missouri Department of Transportation to add Amtrak service from Kansas City to St. Joseph and Kansas City to southwest Missouri.
So shortsighted. Expanding/widening highways, but not funding new #Amtrak service.
If you're from #Missouri and curious what's going on in the Missouri Legislature, follow @MissouriLegislationTracker to see what bills are filed and what their status is.
"As of today, legislatures in thirteen states, including Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Utah have introduced bills to allow religious chaplains to serve as school counselors or volunteers in schools[.]
Texas already has a law in place to allow chaplains in schools since it passed SB 763 in Summer 2023."
"The following is a list of legislation set to be discussed in the Emerging Issues committee on Wednesday:
HB 1520 - Would make the gender-affirming treatment ban permanent and retroactive,
HB 1519 - Would protect from liability any medical professionals who refuse to assist with a gender transition,
HB 1674 - Requires private employers to provide biological sex-exclusive bathrooms to employees,
HB 2355 - Requires schools to provide biological sex-exclusive bathrooms, locker rooms, and changing rooms,
HB 2308 - Requires schools to provide biological sex-exclusive bathrooms, locker rooms, and changing rooms and creates a legal framework for suing non-compliant schools,
HB 2309 - Eliminates the difference between ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ within state law,
HB 2357 - Requires all public bathrooms to be biological sex-exclusive." #trans#queer#missouri#STL#KCMO#MOleg
January 8, 5 pm Central Time, there's a PROMO webinar about the transphobic and homophobic bills we can expect from the #MOleg this year. I will make every effort to listen and take notes, but I'm injured and not totally reliable at the moment. Let me know if there's a better hashtag to use to reach other queer Missourians!
"The 2024 legislative session begins 1/3/2024 and, with approximately 30 anti-LGBTQ+ bills, there is a lot to understand. This is why we host an annual webinar at the start of the year to give you knowledge and answer your questions.
Join us on Monday, January 8 at 5 p.m. for our 2024 Missouri Legislative Preview webinar where you'll be able to understand what is upcoming — both the good and bad bills — and how you can get involved in the process.
We knew this session would renew targets on LGBTQ+, Black, and Brown Missourians with a hyper focus on students. We'll talk about some of these education-related bills alongside other items like the Youth Mental Health Preservation Act."
If you are #trans and a minor in #Missouri, the #MOleg has taken your access to transition healthcare away. (Because they're awful people with empty lives, and I'm sorry they have power over us.)
There is a program that will help connect you and your parents with gender-affirming medical care in another state, with small grants to help with travel:
This is the kind of bill Missouri loves to pass, but I haven't been paying enough attention to whether the current clowns are able to see what a terrible law this would be (for them!)
Any #MOleg watchers that have a good read on the current Wacky Fascist Nonsense Quotient? I know the Legislature is still at war with Missouri libraries, which is where I would guess this is still aimed.
"A new bill in Missouri could significantly curtail the ability of companies in the state to pull business with other companies over anti-trans, anti-abortion, or other policies. The bill, Senate Bill 1061, would ban companies doing business with the state from engaging in 'economic boycotts' over a large list of issues, including transgender care and abortion. The boycott ban includes 'refusing to deal with' or 'terminating business with' other companies over these policies. This recent move comes after recent high-profile cases of companies pulling business with X, formerly Twitter, over rising hate speech on the platform.
The bill stipulates that companies doing business with the state of Missouri cannot engage in economic boycotts targeted at other companies over issues traditionally supported by conservative politicians. Notably, the ban applies not only to companies doing business with the state of Missouri but also to companies doing business with any political subdivision of the state. Typically, this includes counties, city governments, public schools, public libraries, and more. This would affect the nearly 700 businesses that have direct contracts with the state, and countless more that have contracts with school boards and local governments.
Under this law, companies that enter into contracts with any of the aforementioned entities would be barred from 'refusing to deal with,' 'terminating business with,' or otherwise engaging in economic activities designed to penalize a company over that company’s views relating to 'not facilitating sex or gender change' or not facilitating 'access to abortion.' It also includes other topics, such as boycotts over environmental policies and firearms."
Missouri Representative Chris Sanders says he's considering no longer being a Republican. Apparently he is a MAGA guy, so I don't have any idea whether he means he'll quit, switch to being a Democrat, or switch to an independent or third party.