Sleeping Baby in dark room (Photo by Kevin Keith on Unsplash)

House grants initial approval to bill that would allow prison nurseries in Missouri

(Missouri Independent) -The House gave initial approval Wednesday to a bill that would allow newborns to remain with their incarcerated mothers for the first year and a half of the baby’s life. The bill would permit the Missouri Department of Corrections to establish nurseries within the state’s correctional facilities, allowing children born to incarcerated women to […]

Screenshot from Virtual press conference of Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack

Vilsack: Fertilizer prices are biggest worry for farmers after Russian invasion

(Missouri Independent) – The Russian invasion of Ukraine this week might drive up the costs of farm fertilizers globally — which nearly quadrupled last year in price in the United States and remain high — and presents an opportunity for unscrupulous companies to artificially inflate those prices further, according to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack. “That’s […]

North Central Missouri College Website V1 (NCMC)

North Central Missouri College scholarship recipients recognized at reception

The 2021-2022 North Central Missouri College Scholarship Reception was held on Wednesday, February 16th, in the Jeanette Hoffman Robison Auditorium at the Ketcham Community Center. Over 260 students were recognized for receiving an NCMC Foundation, Athletic, SSS, or other institutional scholarships. The North Central Missouri College Foundation hosts this annual event. Phyllis Jackson, NCMC Foundation […]

Gavel and Law book news graphic

State judges across the U.S. face growing GOP pushback against rulings in election cases

Missouri Independent) – In mid-December, Texas’ highest criminal court revoked the state attorney general’s ability to use his office to prosecute election-related cases without the request of a district or county attorney. In an 8-1 opinion, the all-Republican court weakened Attorney General Ken Paxton’s power to independently go after perpetrators of voter fraud, a problem he says […]

Mercer Homecoming

New dates announced for Mercer Homecoming

New dates have been announced for the Mercer Homecoming celebration this year. The Mercer Homecoming Committee has decided to move away from Labor Day weekend and hold the Homecoming events the last weekend in July. This year, those dates are July 28th through the 30th. According to Jeff Girdner, the change occurred because the committee […]

American Farm Bureau Federation president Zippy Duvall spoke at the organization’s 2022 annual convention in Atlanta, Georgia (photo provided by American Farm Bureau Federation)

American Farm Bureau Federation claims it’s the ‘voice of agriculture,’ Others beg to differ

(Missouri Independent) – This story was originally published as a collaboration between Investigate Midwest and Watchdog Writers Group. The American Farm Bureau Federation calls itself the “voice of agriculture,” a slogan it trademarked in 2007. But as the divide between agribusiness and small farmers has grown in recent decades, a unified voice of agriculture has become harder to […]