Columbia Daily Tribune
During this year’s legislative session, Missouri lawmakers rewrote a voter-passed law regulating dog breeders. They also tried to meet a demand of business groups to eliminate cost-of-living increases in the voter-approved state minimum wage.
And since voters imposed strict campaign finance limits in 1994, lawmakers have twice acted to change those limits, including eliminating them entirely in 2006.
The routine rewriting of voter initiatives would end if a new initiative makes the 2012 ballot and wins approval.
A new state ballot initiative committee wants stricter regulations for commercial dog breeding operations in Missouri. Representatives of several animal protection agencies held a forum that drew about 100 people last night to the Columbia Public Library to gather support for an initiative they call Missourians for the Protection of Dogs.
A Missouri group backing ballot initiatives limiting the use of eminent domain claimed yesterday to have recorded evidence that opponents are using the courts to try to delay its petition drive. Missouri Citizens for Property Rights has proposed a pair of constitutional amendments for 2010 that seek to prevent a person’s home, business or other property from being condemned for private development, such as a shopping center.