• KNEA Legislative Agenda
• Legislative Issues
• Legislative Week in Review
• School Funding Central
• State Board News
• Take Action Now (LAC)
• Under the Dome Today

March 6, 2008

House Taxation Committee takes up uniform approach to sales tax exemptions

Up for discussion and amendment today in the House Taxation Committee was HB 2938 a bill which would establish a set of rules under which 501 (c) (3) charitable organizations (non-profits) would be eligible for certain sales tax exemptions.

Current practice is to run bills for individual organizations that come before the legislature to request an exemption. The result of this practice is a statute that lists each individual organization and its exemption. The statute is now up to quadruple a in the list and there have been numerous sales tax exemption bills introduced this year.

HB 2938 would first grandfather in all existing exemptions and then establish that certain organizations would not pay sales tax on their own purchases (these are organizations that provide services to our most vulnerable citizens – adoption services, food banks, battered women’s shelters, etc.). All non-profit charitable organizations would not have to collect sales tax for “isolated fund raisers” such as selling tickets to a banquet or other event.

A series of amendments are being offered by the bill’s author Rep. Jeff Whitham (R-Garden City ). Today they only got to two of them.

• The first amendment would offer exemptions for organizations serving the mentally retarded and blind. Services for the deaf are already in the bill. The amendment was divided so that they could consider mentally retarded and blind separately. The motion on the mentally retarded failed. The motion to include services for the blind passed.
• The next amendment would delete sub-section 2 of section 1 of the bill which says organizations will not be required to collect sales tax on ticket sales to one-day events. By striking this section, the cost to the state would decrease. There is some concern that the fiscal note would be harmful to state revenues. This amendment would reduce the fiscal impact by $10 million. This amendment failed.

Committee Chair Kenny Wilk (R-Lansing) said several times that the committee would take the necessary time to craft a workable bill. We expect this discussion to continue next week.

Three Senate Bills in House Ed Committee

Hearings were held on three Senate bills this morning.

Senate Bill 421 would allow 10^th grade students to participate in concurrent enrollment at the post-secondary level. Current law allows juniors and seniors and gifted freshmen and sophomores. This bill passed the Senate on a vote of 40 – 0.

Senate Bill 404 sets rules on tuition and fees at the newly created Kansas Academy of Math and Science at Fort Hays State University. This bill generated a lively discussion which appeared to show only limited support for the program at all. We’ll see what happens when they work the bill later. This bill passed the Senate on a vote of 39 – 0.

Senate Bill 507 establishes the METS (Mathematics, Engineering, Technology, and Science) education innovation council under the Department of Commerce. The only questions had to do with why it would be in Commerce and not under the Regents. This bill passed the Senate on a vote of 39 – 0.

None of the bills were acted on today.

Senate Education Committee takes up cyberbullying.

A hearing was held in the Senate Education Committee on HB 2758 dealing with bullying. Last year the Legislature passed an anti-bullying bill and this year they are trying to amend the law by including cyberbullying. KNEA provided testimony in favor of this addition.

High School football championships at KU and KSU?

The House Federal and State Affairs Committee held a hearing on HB 2801, a bill to allow the Kansas State High School Athletics Association (KSHSAA) to hold state football championships at the University of Kansas Memorial Stadium, the Kansas State University stadium, and Wagner Field.

Talk about a simple bill! This is one of those rare bills that is only two sentences long and one of those sentences simply says when it takes effect. The guts of the bill are as follows:

The Kansas state high school activities association shall be allowed to use the university of Kansas memorial stadium and the Kansas state university stadium and Wagner field for state championship high school football games.

Proponents were parents and high school athletes; opponents included the KSHSAA who stated that this is allowable already and that there are many issues to consider when choosing locations for the championships including central locations and size of the venue.

No action was taken on the bill.

KNEA Under the Dome Archives
2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005