State lawmakers and Gov. Eric Greitens will have to find an additional $26.3 million in the coming months to satisfy years of underpayment to more than 3,000 blind people.
In a judgment entered late last month and made public Sunday, Cole County Circuit Court Judge Patricia Joyce outlined the latest tally owed by the state, noting that taxpayers could have been billed $7 million less if the state had settled the long-running lawsuit five years ago.
The payout is due to blind people who had been shorted by the Missouri Department of Social Services’ blind pension fund, which was put in place in the 1920s as a way to provide a social safety net for the blind.
Today, about 3,000 blind Missourians are paid about $728 a month from a special levy on property taxes. In 2006, the Missouri Council of the Blind sued the state for using money flowing into the program for other government costs.
Joyce sided with the blind, but the state has been using various appeals to keep the case alive. Those delays have cost taxpayers millions of dollars because Joyce has ordered the state to pay interest at 9 percent per year.
“The state will be paying over $2 million a year in interest until they pay people, so it’s in their interest to get the judgment satisfied,” said attorney John Ammann of St. Louis University Legal Clinics, who helped litigate the case.
Attorney General Josh Hawley’s office has until Nov. 6 to decide its next step. A spokeswoman did not have an immediate response to the ruling.
For some of those affected, the payout will be added to their monthly check. Others will receive a lump sum payout ranging from a few dollars to an estimated $3,000, Ammann said.
But, between Hawley and the Legislature, it remains unclear when those payouts will be made available. Lawmakers are not due back to the Capitol until January and the budgeting process typically lasts until May.