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May 7, 2003

A few high points for school finance during the session…but none prevailed

The first two hopes were amendments offered by Doug Patterson in the House and Barbara Allen in the Senate to restore the $27 cut from base state aid per pupil by Governor Graves last August. Both amendments failed.

Then, just prior to the veto session, Governor Sebelius put out a budget amendment that would have restored the $27 cut. That proposal was buried in the rancorous debate over which “smoke and mirrors” plan was better and fell victim to party line votes.

Then there was the best proposal of the year – the Bipartisan House Freshman Plan announced at the start of the veto session. Ultimately that plan too failed but not before it gave us all a real sense of just who is willing to stand up – at least in the House – for realistic solutions to the state’s budget woes and better funding for our schools and other critical state programs.

Who voted for the Freshman plan?

Voting for the bill were (Freshman sponsors in italics):

Barbara Ballard, Rob Boyer, Sydney Carlin, Ray Cox, Barbara Craft, Marti Crow, Paul Davis, Stanley Dreher, Bill Feuerborn, Geraldine Flaharty, Vaughn Flora, Ruby Gilbert, Jerry Henry, Don Hill, Tom Holland, Deena Horst, Terrie Huntington, Jeff Jack, Bill Kassebaum, Nancy Kirk, Annie Kuether, Bruce Larkin, Ward Loyd, Melvin Minor, Judy Morrison, Cindy Neighbor, Rocky Nichols, Ed O’Malley, Mike O’Neal, Doug Patterson, Ethel Peterson, Bill Reardon, Roger Reitz, Tom Sawyer, Stephanie Sharp, Tom Sloan, Sue Storm, Josh Svaty, Roger Toelkes, Kevin Yoder, and Jim Yonally.

The tax plan included the following enhancements to the state’s revenue stream:

• A 0.5% increase in the state sales tax (up to 5.8%),
  
• stopping the phase out of last year’s sales tax increase,
  
• a 3.5% income tax surcharge on all brackets, and
  an expanded tax amnesty program.
  
• These enhancements would have generated over $266 million in new revenue for fiscal year 2004 and $1.76 billion over five years.

Although not in the bill considered on the floor, the freshmen proposed using this increased revenue to:

• Fund a $50/pupil increase in Base State Aid Per Pupil in 2004, 2005, and 2006,
  
• eliminate SRS waiting lists,
  
• pay $25 million per year to the KPERS unfunded liability, and
  
• provide for an ending balance of between 3.6% and 4.0% for each of next three years.
  

The Bill that would not die!

After a three week break, the Senate Ways and Means Committee returned to work and, in one of their first acts, resurrected the bill in an amendment to HB 2399! And as if that wasn’t enough, the House added it to their omnibus appropriations bill!

On Thursday, when HB 2239 got to the Senate floor, the Senators voted 35-15 to support an amendment by Sen. Bill Bunten to remove the capital outlay provisions. But later that night, the House narrowly defeated a motion by Rep. Ward Loyd to take it out of their appropriations bill, HB 2471.

When the House took up HB 2471, they passed the bill after a two hour call of the house (during which they are locked in the chamber until every member comes in and votes). The bill ultimately passed on a vote of 63-61. The Senate version of the appropriations bill does not include this provision.

This action set up a controversial show-down in the conference committee. The Senate stood firm for taking the provision out while the House insisted it stay in. Ultimately, they chose to take it out of the appropriations bill and put it instead in HB 2399, a bill that reauthorized the 20 mill statewide property tax levy, helped consolidating school districts hire staff, and allowed for a delay in the June state aid payment.

The conference committee on that bill hammered out language that would allow use of capital outlay under some circumstances for software, utilities, and property/casualty insurance up to 1 ½ % of a districts general fund budget but only if the district did not raise its authorized aggregate mill levy in capital outlay, bond and interest, and LOB.

On the last day of the session, the Senate took up the conference committee report and, on a motion by Sen. Bill Bunten, rejected the report and sent it back to conference. With that action, the House realized the capital outlay provision would sink the whole bill and they chose to simply go back to the Senate’s version of the bill without the capital outlay and concur. That being done, the capital outlay battle was finally ended for this year.

Pretending to want to help schools, the House…

In a maneuver known under the dome as “Christmas tree-ing” a bill, legislators will propose and vote for almost any amendment that might look good on a campaign brochure, knowing that they can easily justify a “NO” vote on the whole bill when it comes to final action.

In this case, the House created a gambling bill on the floor at the end of the session and then began to add amendment after amendment. At one point, Speaker Mays proposed an amendment to send some gaming money to the Topeka Lutheran School – a relative’s school. “I just thought that with everything else I might as well ask; they need the money,” he said. While it was a tongue-in-cheek move, he made a good point.

Representative Mario Goico proposed an amendment to send some of the gambling money to schools to raise teacher salaries. While Goico offered his amendment in a sincere desire to help teachers, he was supported by a number of representatives who are not known for their strong support of school funding. The amendment made it onto the bill. But the representatives are not so naïve as to believe the bill had a chance in the Senate where gaming has been defeated before and the Senate President once said he would not hold a vote on gaming. Before the end of the session, the Senate did debate a different gaming bill which they ultimately defeated on a vote of 4-36.

While trying to load amendments onto the Freshman revenue plan bill, Representative Nichols managed to get a school funding amendment considered. The amendment would have increased base state aid per pupil by $150 over three years. It passed on a vote of 111-13, but only after, realizing it would pass and that it was a recorded vote, 34 conservatives changed their NO votes to YES. They also likely voted in the confidence that the underlying bill would fail. And indeed, while 111 representatives voted to increase school funding in the amendment, only 41 actually voted for the bill that provided that funding. (See list on p.1.)

The moral here? Watch what your legislator says about his or her voting record. What really matters is the consistency of their votes. Voting for an amendment knowing the bill will fail is different from voting for increased school funding every time it comes up.

Last day sees lots of action

• The 20 mill property tax levy, a primary funding source for K-12 education, has to be reauthorized every two years. As of Tuesday, only the Senate had done so. A conference committee slipped the provision into HB 2005 which was adopted by the Senate on a 32-7 vote in the afternoon. The House passed the bill later putting the issue to rest.
• The omnibus appropriations conference committee report, HB 2444, was adopted in the evening by the Senate but the House waited until 4:17 a.m. to take it up. It passed the House with no discussion on a vote of 79-45. The whole bill was held up until the Governor and Republican leadership could agree on the “smoke and mirrors or mirrors and smoke” choices for getting out of the session without cuts or a tax increase. The Governor agreed to the delay in income tax refunds (the Republican proposal) while the Republican leadership agreed to the acceleration of property tax collections (the Governor’s proposal). Once this agreement was made, and the legislation to cement it passed, lawmakers were ready to turn to finalizing appropriations.
• Tax policy. A major provision was run up the pole in a conference committee – decoupling Kansas income tax policy from federal income tax policy on dividends. This had been passed earlier by the Senate and never considered by the House. The decoupling was needed in the event that the Bush tax cut plan should be passed by Congress. By tying our tax policy to the federal policy, the state of Kansas could lose an additional $50 million in revenue. The House still refused to go along, voting against adopting the conference committee report on HB 2387, 36-88. Another tax bill, SB 265 extending last year’s sales tax increase (maintaining the state sales tax rate of 5.3%) was adopted. This important vote will help offset further revenue decreases should the economy remain weak.
• And finally, KPERS issues had been rolled into one bill in conference, HB 2014. Along with the one year extension on the moratorium on death and disability contributions, the report contained three bonding provisions. One applied to a closed group of Regents employees, the second would guarantee the 13th check for ten years, and the third would allow KPERS to issue up to $500 million in pension obligation bonds (down from the Senate suggestion of $750 million) to pay down the unfunded liability. The last of these bond provisions caused major angst for House members and some Senators, but the report was adopted early in the evening by the Senate 30-8 and then at 4:25 a.m. by the House on a vote of 101-16.

Tallying up the good and the bad

Just to highlight a few of our proudest moments, consider these achievements:

• Senate Bill 7, Technical College Governance: Working with USD 259 and the AFL-CIO, we got very important employee protection language amended into the final version of this bill. Employees who transfer to the new entity will retain salary, earned leaves, early retirement incentives, and earned due process protections.
• Senate Bill 57, “Local Control”: Working with Senators Vratil and Umbarger and representatives of KASB, we successfully negotiated compromise language on an issue that has been a battle for many years.
• Senate Bill 119, Due Process for Teachers at the Schools for the Deaf and Blind: This bill, which has been run before, finally passed. It brings teachers at the state schools for the deaf and blind under the same due process procedures as other public school teachers.
• House Bill 2014, KPERS: Most importantly, it guarantees the 13th check for certain retirees for ten years.
• House Bill 2399, Consolidation and delayed state payments: This bill allows the board of a new district created in a consolidation to begin hiring before they actually take office and includes a KNEA amendment allowing them to recognize a bargaining agent. It also stipulates that if the state is late with aid payments in June, a district can delay paying employees only if there is no possible way to make the lump sum and then requires it to be paid as soon as the state aid is received.
• House Bill 2179, Repeal of the prohibition on school employees serving on the State Board of Ed.: KNEA worked hard to move this bill through both chambers and successfully worked to stop attempts to keep the prohibition on K-12 employees while lifting it on community college employees.
• House Bill 2059, Voiding teacher contracts: This anti-teacher bill was voted down in committee.
• House Bill 2060, Eliminating due process hearing officers: The annual anti-teacher due process bill was stopped in committee.
• Senate Bill 181, Worker’s Compensation “Reform”: KNEA worked with the Kansas Coalition on Workplace Safety to get this bill held in the House Commerce Committee. It may come back, but it didn’t pass this year.

School funding outlook bleak; is there a glimmer of hope?

Part of the problem stems from the eagerness with which previous legislatures slashed taxes during the boom of the 90s. Another part of the problem is the aftermath of 9/11 and the economic downturn we are now facing.

Schools emerge from this session with the same amount of money they had last year. Flat funding – what too many legislators call being “held harmless” – will have a detrimental effect on our schools. Teachers and support staff will be let go; class sizes will go up; supply budgets will shrink – they have to if we intend to heat our buildings in winter or provide property insurance.

We are grateful that we were not cut again. We are grateful that some legislators are getting the word from their constituents that schools and public education are critical to the success of Kansas and critical to economic development. But we are all frustrated that so many legislators seem more focused on re-election than they are on good state policy.

Shifting money around on paper is not a resolution to the state’s revenue woes. We acknowledge the resolve of Johnson County legislators who work tirelessly to get help for their schools if the legislative will is not there to get help for all schools. But we are more encouraged by the 41 members of the House of Representatives who voted for the “freshman plan.” We fervently hope that the efforts of these freshmen will encourage other legislators to join in the battle for protecting the critical services that state government provides: K-12 education, support for the elderly and disabled, higher education, and the transportation infrastructure that supports Kansas commerce. Every dollar spent on these programs is a dollar that goes directly into the Kansas economy.

If Kansas is to prosper and grow, we must do all we can to support Kansas as the “quality of life high point on the prairie.”

This is the last edition of Legislative Update for the 2003 legislative session.

KNEA Legislative Contacts

Blake West, President
Mark Desetti, Director, Legislative and Political Advocacy
Terry Forsyth, Director, Political Action

The KNEA Lobby Team consists of elected leaders and staff. The Lobby Team welcomes member feedback on issues before the Legislature and on this site.