Fitzpatrick Named State Treasurer
January 3, 2019
Charlea Estes-Jones
Local State Representative Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Cassville) was named as the incoming State Treasurer by Governor Mike Parson last week. Fitzpatrick, of Cassville and formerly of Shell Knob, was recently elected to his third term in the State House of Representatives and was serving as house budget chairman.
Fitzpatrick was the youngest state budget chair at 28 years old when he was selected in August 2016. He was first elected to the House in 2012 at the age of 25.
Regarding Fitzpatrick’s appointment as treasurer, Gov. Parson said, “I am honored to appoint Scott Fitzpatrick as the next State Treasurer. Scott has built his career, as a small business owner and legislator, with a proven track record of being a wise steward and protector of the people’s money. From the beginning of this administration, it has been a top priority that we strive to provide stability and instill confidence for all Missourians that we can and will move forward. Missourians will soon have another fully qualified, ready to lead, fiscal conservative managing the Treasurer’s office.”
Fitzpatrick released a statement, “I want to thank Governor Parson for the tremendous honor of being selected as Missouri’s next state treasurer. As house budget chairman, I’ve worked to protect Missouri’s taxpayers by passing balanced budgets that eliminate wasteful spending while investing in our shared priorities. As State Treasurer, I’ll continue to work each and every day to promote government transparency and efficiency.”
Fitzpatrick said there had been conversations with the governor prior to the announcement. He said, “I’d been talking to their office a little bit and met with the governor a week before. I knew that it was a possibility, but I still thought it seemed unlikely. I knew there was some interest on their part, if they asked me to do it, I’d be honored to do it.”
Overall, Fitzpatrick said he has a good relationship with Gov. Parson’s office. “In general, we are on the same page. It’ll be a different relationship now instead of before. In general, I think the governor has done a good job. We had a couple disagreements really early on, but even since that point, regardless of treasurer stuff, we’d worked well together on a lot of issues,” he said.
Fitzpatrick was chosen for the position based on his history as budget chair, as well as his business experience. Starting his first business endeavor while still attending high school, Fitzpatrick’s dock manufacturing company, MariCorps U.S. had six employees when he went away to college at the University of Missouri in 2006. Today, he says it has between 55 and 60 employees.
He said, “My dad owned a dock company in the late 90s. He sold it in the early 2000s. When I was still in high school, we lived on the lake. I started doing repair work and doing slip inserts over the summer as a business to generate spending money.
“When I first had a full time payroll, in January 2006, there was a fire that burned down a dock and I was friends with some of the people who owned slips on that dock It gave me the opportunity to do the repair work on that dock. And then a tornado hit spring 2006 that went through Branson and flipped a dock and it landed on another dock.”
Those two events served as the catalyst for Fitzpatrick’s successful business today.
With Fitzpatrick taking over as treasurer, his seat will be vacated beginning in January. The timeline for a special election for that seat will be determined by the governor eventually. Fitzpatrick said it could be as early as the April election.
Even with transitioning to the treasurer position, Fitzpatrick said he plans to continue to reside in Cassville. He said, “As budget chairman, it was a lot of work. A lot of people say the legislature is a part time job, but I was in Jefferson City more weeks last year than I wasn’t, even with us not in session.
“From a workload standpoint as the state treasurer, I’ll be in Jeff City a lot and traveling the state a lot, as well. Then, I’ll have to run a statewide election campaign in 2020. I’m less than two years away from having to convince people to reelect me to that position. In terms of balancing it, I went through the process of learning how to fly and bought a little airplane and use that to get back and forth now. I intend to continue living in Cassville and commuting to and from Jeff City. I can be door-to-door in Jeff City in an hour and 15 minutes flying.
“I’ll continue to stay in Jeff City quite a bit and to balance it, but we’ll make sacrifices to make it work.”
Fitzpatrick said the day to day operations of MariCorp have been mostly in the hands of his employees. He said, “I’m there when I’m not in Jeff City, but I do legislative work and focus on the business out of that same location. My expectation is I’ll still be involved at a high level just overseeing the financial aspects as well as being available for problems. But my day job will be state treasurer. The business, I’ll continue to own it, but it will be run primarily by other people. I’m sure I’ll have to off load some of those responsibilities, but it shouldn’t change too much.”
Fitzpatrick graduated from Cassville High School in 2006. He earned his bachelor’s from the University of Missouri in 2010 before being elected to the State House of Representatives in 2012.
Fitzpatrick lives in Cassville with his wife, Mallory, and their two sons, Luke and Carson.
Charlea Estes-Jones
Local State Representative Scott Fitzpatrick (R-Cassville) was named as the incoming State Treasurer by Governor Mike Parson last week. Fitzpatrick, of Cassville and formerly of Shell Knob, was recently elected to his third term in the State House of Representatives and was serving as house budget chairman.
Fitzpatrick was the youngest state budget chair at 28 years old when he was selected in August 2016. He was first elected to the House in 2012 at the age of 25.
Regarding Fitzpatrick’s appointment as treasurer, Gov. Parson said, “I am honored to appoint Scott Fitzpatrick as the next State Treasurer. Scott has built his career, as a small business owner and legislator, with a proven track record of being a wise steward and protector of the people’s money. From the beginning of this administration, it has been a top priority that we strive to provide stability and instill confidence for all Missourians that we can and will move forward. Missourians will soon have another fully qualified, ready to lead, fiscal conservative managing the Treasurer’s office.”
Fitzpatrick released a statement, “I want to thank Governor Parson for the tremendous honor of being selected as Missouri’s next state treasurer. As house budget chairman, I’ve worked to protect Missouri’s taxpayers by passing balanced budgets that eliminate wasteful spending while investing in our shared priorities. As State Treasurer, I’ll continue to work each and every day to promote government transparency and efficiency.”
Fitzpatrick said there had been conversations with the governor prior to the announcement. He said, “I’d been talking to their office a little bit and met with the governor a week before. I knew that it was a possibility, but I still thought it seemed unlikely. I knew there was some interest on their part, if they asked me to do it, I’d be honored to do it.”
Overall, Fitzpatrick said he has a good relationship with Gov. Parson’s office. “In general, we are on the same page. It’ll be a different relationship now instead of before. In general, I think the governor has done a good job. We had a couple disagreements really early on, but even since that point, regardless of treasurer stuff, we’d worked well together on a lot of issues,” he said.
Fitzpatrick was chosen for the position based on his history as budget chair, as well as his business experience. Starting his first business endeavor while still attending high school, Fitzpatrick’s dock manufacturing company, MariCorps U.S. had six employees when he went away to college at the University of Missouri in 2006. Today, he says it has between 55 and 60 employees.
He said, “My dad owned a dock company in the late 90s. He sold it in the early 2000s. When I was still in high school, we lived on the lake. I started doing repair work and doing slip inserts over the summer as a business to generate spending money.
“When I first had a full time payroll, in January 2006, there was a fire that burned down a dock and I was friends with some of the people who owned slips on that dock It gave me the opportunity to do the repair work on that dock. And then a tornado hit spring 2006 that went through Branson and flipped a dock and it landed on another dock.”
Those two events served as the catalyst for Fitzpatrick’s successful business today.
With Fitzpatrick taking over as treasurer, his seat will be vacated beginning in January. The timeline for a special election for that seat will be determined by the governor eventually. Fitzpatrick said it could be as early as the April election.
Even with transitioning to the treasurer position, Fitzpatrick said he plans to continue to reside in Cassville. He said, “As budget chairman, it was a lot of work. A lot of people say the legislature is a part time job, but I was in Jefferson City more weeks last year than I wasn’t, even with us not in session.
“From a workload standpoint as the state treasurer, I’ll be in Jeff City a lot and traveling the state a lot, as well. Then, I’ll have to run a statewide election campaign in 2020. I’m less than two years away from having to convince people to reelect me to that position. In terms of balancing it, I went through the process of learning how to fly and bought a little airplane and use that to get back and forth now. I intend to continue living in Cassville and commuting to and from Jeff City. I can be door-to-door in Jeff City in an hour and 15 minutes flying.
“I’ll continue to stay in Jeff City quite a bit and to balance it, but we’ll make sacrifices to make it work.”
Fitzpatrick said the day to day operations of MariCorp have been mostly in the hands of his employees. He said, “I’m there when I’m not in Jeff City, but I do legislative work and focus on the business out of that same location. My expectation is I’ll still be involved at a high level just overseeing the financial aspects as well as being available for problems. But my day job will be state treasurer. The business, I’ll continue to own it, but it will be run primarily by other people. I’m sure I’ll have to off load some of those responsibilities, but it shouldn’t change too much.”
Fitzpatrick graduated from Cassville High School in 2006. He earned his bachelor’s from the University of Missouri in 2010 before being elected to the State House of Representatives in 2012.
Fitzpatrick lives in Cassville with his wife, Mallory, and their two sons, Luke and Carson.