JEFFERSON CITY -- Democrats hold fewer than a third of the seats in the Missouri House, so they don't often sit in the driver's seat.
But they may have some leverage this week when legislators decide whether to put a transportation sales tax on the Nov. 4 statewide ballot.
When it cleared the House last month, the proposal relied on Democrats for its winning margin. The 96-member majority was made up of 63 Republicans and 33 Democrats.
Since 82 votes are needed for passage, the sponsor, Rep. Dave Hinson, R-St. Clair, must hang on to at least 19 Democrats when he asks members this week to accept the Senate's scaled-down version.
The potential wrinkle is that the Legislature also is expected to vote this week on overriding Gov. Jay Nixon's veto of an income tax cut. Critics say the Legislature is sending mixed signals by cutting and raising taxes at the same time. At least one Democrat, Rep. Chris Kelly of Columbia, has said he will not vote for the sales tax increase if the income tax cut is enacted over Nixon's veto.
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Hinson, however, said he isn't worried that Democrats will bolt from the roads proposal en masse.
"To me, it's hard to think they would possibly kill one of the largest union job bills that we could possibly pass," he said.
Even if he loses some Democratic votes, Hinson said he expects to "pick up a half-dozen Republican votes."
Republicans control the House 108-51, with four vacancies.
Hinson said the sales tax hike is more palatable to Republicans now that the Senate pared the proposal down from its earlier 1-cent level. The Senate backed a three-fourths of 1 percent increase, which would raise $534 million annually to build roads, bridges and local transportation projects.
Highway construction advocates have been working on the proposal for years. Jack Cardetti, a former Nixon aide who now lobbies for the Missouri Transportation Alliance, was buttonholing Democratic legislators in the hallway outside the chamber last week in an attempt to shore up votes.
But Democrats also are getting pressure from groups such as the Missouri Association for Social Welfare, which says the sales tax is regressive and hardest on low-income people.
The current state sales tax rate is 4.225 percent, though local taxes can double that.
In a letter today to House members, the social welfare association said that increasing the state's 17-cent-per-gallon fuel tax would be a better solution to the highway funding problem.
"if Missouri's fuel tax was increased by a dime, it would not significantly fall out of line with neighboring states," wrote the group's executive director, Jeanette Mott Oxford. Currently, Missouri's fuel tax is lower than all neighboring states except Oklahoma, she said.
(The transportation tax is HJR68.)
Virginia Young is the Jefferson City bureau chief of the Post-Dispatch. Follow her on twitter at @virginiayoung.
