On the Issues

Jake is a leader on a variety of issues in St. Louis County and in Jefferson City. There’s too much to list in one place, but here’s a sample of some of the work Jake is most proud of:

Consumer Protection

Jake has been a loud voice for consumers since his days as an Assistant Attorney General prosecuting scammers. As a legislator, Jake worked hard to protect consumer interests when the legislature passed massive telecommunications deregulation legislation. Jake wrote new language containing important protections for billpayers, and made sure that language became law. He has played a similar role in other contexts, for example writing new and stronger consumer protections for rental car customers that became law in 2007.

Jake is most proud of his signature legislative achievement: the Textbook Transparency Act of 2008 which promotes better accountability and price disclosure for students who are too often taken advantage of by publishers gaming the system. For his work on this bipartisan bill, Jake was named “Legislator of the Year” by the Associated Students of the University of Missouri.

Honest and Open Government

Jake is committed to making Missouri government more fair, less wasteful, and more transparent. He has sponsored legislation to ban the “revolving door” that currently allows ex-politicians to leave their government jobs and become special interest lobbyists the very next day.

Jake is also a leading advocate for election reform. His bill to require access to paper ballots for all voters passed the Missouri House with a broad bipartisan majority in 2008, and he has high hopes to get it over the finish line the next time around. Jake has also worked on other reforms to increase voter participation such as instant run-off voting, no-fault absentee balloting, and mailed ballots.

Fighting for Our Region

Through his work on the Economic Development Committee, Jake works hard to make sure that we have the resources necessary to promote jobs in St. Louis County. Jake believes in local control, and has defended St. Louis county and municipal leaders from unfair state mandates and politically-motivated meddling by outside interests.

Similarly, Jake has been honored by the Missouri Bar for his work protecting our judiciary from unfair and partisan attacks.

Working Together

Jake is a leader in the Democratic party and is actively involved in local and statewide Democratic campaign efforts. But to get things done in Jefferson City, Jake knows the importance of putting politics aside and promoting a bipartisan agenda. So, when fraudulent operators of for-profit clothing “donation” boxes were pretending to be a charity, Jake assembled a broad bipartisan coalition to pass legislation cracking down on them.

When local advocates for foster children needed bipartisan support for an important health care bill, they turned to Jake and asked for his help assembling legislators on both sides of the aisle. 48 hours later, Jake had rounded up support from more than half of his colleagues, including prominent Republican and Democratic leaders. (For this bipartisan work, Jake was honored locally by the Epworth Home for Children.)

And a Whole Lot More

Believe it or not, all this is just the tip of the iceberg. To see a list of all the bills Jake has sponsored and cosponsored each year, click on either 2007 or 2008.

To read some of Jake’s press coverage, click here.