JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Area state lawmakers are predicting the special session of the General Assembly that began Wednesday to be productive and relatively swift.

Gov. Bob Holden called the lawmakers into session to tackle three tasks: crafting a prescription drug benefit for the elderly, fixing a livestock pricing law and exempting this summer's federal tax rebates from state income taxes.

State Rep. Denny Merideth, D-Caruthersville, said there is a strong consensus among lawmakers on a course of action on all three issues thanks to sincere bipartisan efforts leading up to the session.

On prescription drugs, Merideth said, Democrats and Republicans "really worked with each other to present us with a bill we can all look at and be proud of. The same can be said of the other two points as well."

State Rep. Pat Naeger, R-Perryville, is the House bill's leading Republican sponsor. Naeger served on the governor's prescription drug task force, which drafted recommendations on which the bill is based.

Session timetable

Senate President Pro Tem Peter Kinder, R-Cape Girardeau, said the special session could possibly be concluded by the end of next week, but was reluctant to nail down a timetable for lawmakers to finish work.

"It is hard to foresee these things with all of the possible twists and turns until you get a bill on the floor," Kinder said.

In the weeks leading up to session, some lawmakers were concerned that the special session could get stuck in a political morass with Republicans angry over the executive order Holden signed in June to bypass the Legislature and unilaterally extend collective bargaining rights to many state workers.

Kinder created a special Senate committee to investigate the order and the involvement of organized labor in its drafting. Several Democrats have branded the committee a "political exercise" and a "witch hunt."

The committee will hold its first meeting today. Kinder said there is no reason for animosity over collective bargaining to spill over into debate over the three issues being considered in the special session.

Livestock marketing

The livestock marketing issue is likely to be the most contentious. House Speaker Jim Kreider, D-Nixa and a cattleman himself, is opposed to an outright repeal of the existing law, which was designed to prevent meat packers from discriminating against family and small producers.

Kreider was criticized by some House members for appointing a special committee packed with urban lawmakers to handle the livestock pricing bill instead of sending it to the House Agriculture Committee.

State Rep. Peter Myers, R-Sikeston, will serve on the special committee but isn't happy with the panel's composition.

"The speaker has stacked this committee against rural Missouri," Myers said. "He even excluded the longest serving member of the Agriculture Committee from this process, who has been a key negotiator on this issue."

Lawmakers are limited to considering bills on issues included in the governor's call for the special session.

State Rep. Jason Crowell, R-Cape Girardeau, last month had asked the governor to include election reform in the session.

On Tuesday, Crowell sent Holden a letter requesting lawmakers be allowed to revisit a recently enacted -- and some would say flawed -- law on vehicle window tinting.

Those requests were rejected. Holden has repeatedly said he wanted to limit subjects considered in the session to those on which there is reasonable consensus and that require immediate action.

mpowers@semissourian.com

(573) 635-4608