Bill Text: MO HB110 | 2013 | Regular Session | Enrolled
Bill Title: Changes the laws regarding the selection of public officials
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Republican 2-0)
Status: (Passed) 2013-09-11 - No Motion Made - to override Governor's veto [HB110 Detail]
Download: Missouri-2013-HB110-Enrolled.html
FIRST REGULAR SESSION
[TRULY AGREED TO AND FINALLY PASSED]
SENATE COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE FOR
HOUSE COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE FOR
97TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY
AN ACT
To repeal sections 115.027, 115.607, 473.730, 473.733, and 473.737, RSMo, and to enact in lieu thereof six new sections relating to the selection of public officials.
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the state of Missouri, as follows:
Section A. Sections 115.027, 115.607, 473.730, 473.733, and 473.737, RSMo, are repealed and six new sections enacted in lieu thereof, to be known as sections 26.226, 115.027, 115.607, 473.730, 473.733, and 473.737, to read as follows:
26.226. In case of death, resignation, removal from office, conviction after impeachment, or vacancy from any cause in the office of lieutenant governor, the governor shall, within thirty days, issue a writ of election to fill the vacancy for the remainder of the term in which such vacancy occurred and until the successor is elected, commissioned, and qualified. Such election shall be held at the next general election. The candidates for the election shall be nominated and placed on the ballot in accordance with the provisions of sections 115.305 to 115.405. In the case of impeachment, the office shall remain vacant until such impeachment is determined. If acquitted, the lieutenant governor shall be reinstated in office. During any period of time when the office of lieutenant governor is vacant, the chief administrative assistant of the vacating lieutenant governor shall perform all ministerial duties during the period of such vacancy, provided however, that any duties of the lieutenant governor as president of the senate shall be performed by the president pro tempore of the senate during the period of such vacancy.
115.027. 1. Each board of election commissioners shall be composed of four members, appointed by the governor with the advice and consent of the senate. Two commissioners on each board shall be members of one major political party, and two commissioners on each board shall be members of the other major political party. In no case shall more than two commissioners on a board be members of the same political party. When appointing commissioners, the governor shall designate one commissioner on each board to be chairman of the board and one commissioner on each board to be secretary of the board. The chairman and secretary of a board shall not be members of the same political party.
2. In jurisdictions with boards of election commissioners as the election authority, the governor may appoint to the board one representative from each established political party. The representative shall not be a member of the board for purposes of subsection 1 of this section. The state chair of each established political party shall submit a list of no more than four names from which the governor shall select the representative for that party. The representative shall not have voting status, and shall not be compensated, but shall be allowed to participate in discussions and be informed of any meeting of the board.
3. The governor shall not make any appointment, during the legislative interim, to the board of election commissioners in any county with a charter form of government and with more than nine hundred fifty thousand inhabitants.
115.607. 1. No person shall be elected or shall serve as a member of a county committee who is not, for one year next before the person's election, both a registered voter of and a resident of the county and the committee district from which the person is elected if such district shall have been so long established, and if not, then of the district or districts from which the same shall have been taken. Except as provided in subsections 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 of this section, the membership of a county committee of each established political party shall consist of a man and a woman elected from each township or ward in the county.
2. In each county of the first classification containing the major portion of a city which has over three hundred thousand inhabitants, [two members of the committee, a man and a woman, shall be elected from each ward in the city. Any township entirely contained in the city shall have no additional representation on the county committee. The election authority for the county shall, not later than six months after the decennial census has been reported to the President of the United States, divide the most populous township outside the city into eight subdistricts of contiguous and compact territory and as nearly equal in population as practicable. The subdistricts shall be numbered from one upward consecutively, which numbers shall, insofar as practicable, be retained upon reapportionment. Two members of the county committee, a man and a woman, shall be elected from each such subdistrict. Six members of the committee, three men and three women, shall be elected from the second and third most populous townships outside the city. Four members of the committee, two men and two women, shall be elected from the other townships outside the city] members of the committee shall be elected from the districts of each state representative that are in any way contained in the county in the following manner: within six months after each legislative reapportionment, each portion of a legislative district contained in the county shall constitute a single committee district. Two men and two women shall be elected from each committee district formed from a legislative district that is wholly contained in the county as members of the committee, two men and two women shall be elected from each committee district formed from a legislative district that is predominantly contained in the county as members of the committee, and one man and one woman shall be elected from each committee district formed from a legislative district that is partially but not predominantly contained in the county as members of the committee.
3. [In any city which has over three hundred thousand inhabitants, the major portion of which is located in a county with a charter form of government, for the portion of the city located within such county and notwithstanding section 82.110, it shall be the duty of the election authority, not later than six months after the decennial census has been reported to the President of the United States, to divide such cities into not less than twenty-four nor more than twenty-five wards after each decennial census. Wards shall be so divided that the number of inhabitants in any ward shall not exceed any other ward of the city and within the same county, by more than five percent, measured by the number of the inhabitants determined at the preceding decennial census.
4.] In each county of the first classification containing a portion, but not the major portion, of a city which has over three hundred thousand inhabitants, ten members of the committee, five men and five women, shall be elected from the district of each state representative wholly contained in the county in the following manner: within six months after each legislative reapportionment, the election authority shall divide each legislative district wholly contained in the county into five committee districts of contiguous territory as compact and as nearly equal in population as may be; two members of the committee, a man and a woman, shall be elected from each committee district. The election authority shall divide the area of the county located within legislative districts not wholly contained in the county into similar committee districts; two members of the committee, a man and a woman, shall be elected from each committee district.
[5.] 4. In each city not situated in a county, two members of the committee, a man and a woman, shall be elected from each ward.
[6.] 5. In all counties with a charter form of government and a population of over nine hundred thousand inhabitants, the county committee persons shall be elected from each township. Within ninety days after August 28, 2002, and within six months after each decennial census has been reported to the President of the United States, the election authority shall divide the county into twenty-eight compact and contiguous townships containing populations as nearly equal in population to each other as is practical.
[7.] 6. If any election authority has failed to adopt a reapportionment plan by the deadline set forth in this section, the county commission, sitting as a reapportionment commission, shall within sixty days after the deadline, adopt a reapportionment plan. Changes of township, ward, or precinct lines shall not affect the terms of office of incumbent party committee members elected from districts as constituted at the time of their election.
473.730. 1. Every county in this state, [and] except the city of St. Louis, shall elect a public administrator at the general election in the year 1880, and every four years thereafter, who shall be ex officio public guardian and conservator in and for the public administrator's county. A candidate for public administrator shall be at least twenty-one years of age and a resident of the state of Missouri and the county in which he or she is a candidate for at least one year prior to the date of the general election for such office. The candidate shall also be a registered voter and shall be current in the payment of all personal and business taxes. Before entering on the duties of the public administrator's office, the public administrator shall take the oath required by the constitution, and enter into bond to the state of Missouri in a sum not less than ten thousand dollars, with two or more securities, approved by the court and conditioned that the public administrator will faithfully discharge all the duties of the public administrator's office, which bond shall be given and oath of office taken on or before the first day of January following the public administrator's election, and it shall be the duty of the judge of the court to require the public administrator to make a statement annually, under oath, of the amount of property in the public administrator's hands or under the public administrator's control as such administrator, for the purpose of ascertaining the amount of bond necessary to secure such property; and such court may from time to time, as occasion shall require, demand additional security of such administrator, and, in default of giving the same within twenty days after such demand, may remove the administrator and appoint another.
2. The public administrator in all counties, in the performance of the duties required by chapters 473, 474, and 475, is a public officer. The duties specified by section 475.120 are discretionary. The county shall defend and indemnify the public administrator against any alleged breach of duty, provided that any such alleged breach of duty arose out of an act or omission occurring within the scope of duty or employment.
3. After January 1, 2001, all salaried public administrators shall be considered county officials for purposes of section 50.333, subject to the minimum salary requirements set forth in section 473.742.
4. The public administrator for the city of St. Louis shall be appointed by a majority of the circuit judges and associate circuit judges of the twenty-second judicial circuit, en banc. Such public administrator shall meet the same qualifications and requirements specified in subsection 1 of this section for elected public administrators. The elected public administrator holding office on the effective date of this section shall continue to hold such office for the remainder of his or her term.
473.733. The public administrator's certificate of election, if applicable, official oath and bond shall be filed and recorded with the probate clerk, and copies thereof, certified under the seal of such court, shall be evidence. Any person injured by the breach of such bond may sue upon the same in the name of the state for his own use.
473.737. 1. Each public administrator elected or appointed, as now or as hereafter provided for in sections 473.730 to 473.767, is hereby declared to be an officer for the county in which such administrator is elected [and for the city of St. Louis, if elected therein] or appointed. The county commissions of each county in this state shall make suitable provision for an office for the public administrator in the courthouse of the county if suitable space may be had for such an office, and shall be provided as soon as the county commission shall be of the opinion that the business in charge of the public administrator is such as to reasonably require a separate office for the convenience of the public. The public administrator of the city of St. Louis shall have suitable and convenient offices provided for him or her in the civil courts building by that city.
2. Each public administrator of a county, except a county of the first classification having a charter form of government, in which a state mental hospital is located, or any county of the second classification which contains a habilitation center operated by the department of mental health and which does not adjoin a county of the first classification shall be entitled to one secretary for one hundred cases or more handled by the office of the public administrator in the immediately preceding calendar year. Each secretary employed pursuant to the provisions of this subsection shall be paid in the same pay range as a court clerk II in the circuit court personnel system. All compensation paid secretaries employed pursuant to the provisions of this subsection shall be paid out of the county treasury and the commissioner of administration shall annually reimburse each county for the compensation so paid upon proper demand being made out of appropriations made for that purpose. The public administrator in such counties may also appoint a person to act as public administrator to serve during the absence of the public administrator.
3. The governing bodies of each county and each city not within a county of this state may provide clerical personnel, not qualifying as status of deputy, for the public administrator of the county, and such personnel shall be provided when the governing body is of the opinion that the business in charge of the public administrator is such as to reasonably require such personnel for the welfare of the public.
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