From Missouri Digital News: https://mdn.org

JEFFERSON CITY - Twice a year the time changes in Missouri, and on Tuesday, at least one lawmaker said he wants to end that practice.

State Rep. Delus Johnson is the sponsor of a bill that would enter Missouri into the New Standard Time Pact. Once 20 States will join the New Standard Time Pact, the summer time will become the standard time year-round and the actual switching of the clock, twice in a year, will be eliminated.

Implementing daylight saving time year-round would make lighter evenings but darker mornings. Johnson, R-St. Joseph, told the Senate General Laws Committee that he believes lighter evenings will increase the outdoor business production.

“In the United States South Carolina already works on Daylight Saving as New Standard Time Pact,” Johnson said at the Senate hearing.

The Missouri Broadcasters Association opposed the bill because it would create a problem for some television stations that broadcast in more than one state, such the Kansas City and St. Louis television stations, especially if all of the states in the current Central Time Zone did not participate in the pact.

There are other issues such as energy use or public safety that are related with the subject. After the Daylight Saving Time, standardized in the United States in 1966, was extended by one Month in accordance to Energy Policy Act of 2005, since 2007 the summer time in the United States begins on the second Sunday of March and ends on the first Sunday of November. Following the first year after that extension, the United States Department of Energy stated in a 2008 report that the extension saved one-half percent of electricity usage only during the extended period, but it did not examine the use of heating fuels.

The permanent daylight saving time is currently in use in Iceland, Russia, Uzbekistan and Belarus.

It is uncertain whether the Senate will manage to approve the bill in time. The Senate General Laws Committee did not vote on the bill Tuesday and the legislative session ends on May 17. The House passed the bill in early April.

---

Missouri Digital News is produced by Missouri Digital News, Inc. -- a non profit organization of current and former journalists.