Category: Kansas Legislature

Omnibus education policy, budget bill creeps toward finish line in Kansas Legislature

by Noah Taborda, Kansas Reflector

Topeka — Kansas legislators are inching closer to a compromise on an omnibus education bill to fully fund public schools and enact more than a dozen policy provisions, but a divide over special education funding remains.

Public schools in Kansas cover the costs of special education out of their operational budgets and apply for reimbursement from the amount the Legislature appropriates for that year. State law provides that Kansas should pay 92% of excess costs of special education, but there is no enforcement mechanism or penalty should the Legislature do otherwise.

Members of the education conference committee smoothing out differences in House and Senate positions are still at odds over a budget proposal to increase special education funding by $30 million. Proponents say this will help bring the state into compliance with state law.

But Sen. Renee Erickson, R-Wichita, echoed an uneasy sentiment expressed by Republican members toward appropriating more funds to Kansas’ special education students.

“I may sound like a broken record but It’s easy to spend money,” Erickson said. “My question Will and always will be how is that helping our students do better? That’s what I want to know if we give them additional money.”

Already set in House Bill 2567 is full funding of the Kansas State Department of Education budget, a scholarship program for community college students and a provision allowing open enrollment across school districts. The bill contains more than a dozen different policy provisions in addition.

Special education funding has been the subject of significant debate in the House, where last month members narrowly approved and subsequently removed an amendment to an education bill allocating $68 million in funding for these Kansas students.

Rep. Kristey Williams, an Augusta Republican and chairwoman of the House K-12 Education Budget Committee, has led the charge against these additional funds, arguing the state is already meeting its legal requirements. While the nonpartisan legislative research department indicates the state is funding of special education close to 72%, Williams said her own estimates based on “raw figures” indicate Kansas is spending much more.

Sen. Cindy Holscher, D-Overland Park, scoffed at the idea raw figures and rough estimates showed an accurate or truthful estimate.

“I get the feeling the (Kansas K-12 Budget) House chair doesn’t understand the formula for funding our schools or just wants to ignore it for her own personal/extremist agenda to defund our schools,” Holscher said via Twitter, later adding that Williams “would be better served by holding up a sign that says ‘I hate public schools.’”

The Senate and House were able to come to an agreement earlier Wednesday to push the implementation date of a provision easing student transfers between school districts to the 2024-2025 school year. Previously, the measure required school districts to create a policy by January for enrollment capacity and allow open enrollment the following school year.

Sen. Molly Baumgardner, a Louisburg Republican and chairwoman of the Senate Education Committee, said the change came at the request of the governor’s office. She said public schools need to be open to this change if they want to flourish financially.

“We have roughly 16,000 fewer students now in our public schools than two years ago,” Baumgardner said. “If school districts are trying to recoup some money, they need to welcome students and parents that are wanting to make that move. The sooner that move occurs, the sooner they will receive that state funding for that child.”

The measure prohibits school districts from assessing special tuition for nonresident students, and a portion of educational funding would follow the student to the new district.

Representatives also accepted a senate offer to fund the KSDE dyslexia coordinator through the state general fund rather than fees for service.
The House and Senate delegations will meet later Wednesday to further iron out discrepancies regarding special education and other loose ends.

Setting the stage

Senators on the Ways and Means Committee set the stage early Tuesday for the education conference committee debate, choosing to move several Senate education budget items to the education mega bill.

Moved into the conversation on House Bill 2567 were the Gannon school funding plan, Gov. Kelly’s proposal to increase special education funding by $30 million and a KPERS cleanup budget item, along with a note affirming the Senate committee backs these provisions for conversation in conference.

While most committee members were able to get on board, Sen. Pat Pettey, D-Kansas City, Kansas, was uneasy about adding more provisions to a bill in a House-led negotiation.

“I don’t really understand why we would want to add anything more to a list of items that we haven’t dealt with anyway,” Pettey said during the meeting. “All of it, we can deal with it here.”

In the initial meeting of the education conference committee Tuesday, both chambers came to an agreement surrounding the Promise Scholarship Act.

The act provides students who enter certain high-demand fields scholarships for their community or technical college education. All recipients of these funds must work in Kansas for two years after they graduate.

The Senate and House butted heads over the act before the Legislature adjourned its regular session, and it was among the main reasons the education omnibus stalled momentarily.

A compromise proposed by the Senate and agreed upon by the House would reinstate a requirement that students be Kansas residents to qualify. House members proposed opening these scholarships to out-of-state students.

After receiving an email noting that recipients of these scholarships may lose their funding if the Board of Regents removes a Promise Scholarship-eligible program, legislators also agreed to patch up that issue.

“What this is simply indicating is if an institution is offering regents-approved programs and the regents take action to remove a program that a promise scholar still enrolled will continue to be a promise scholar,” Baumgardner said.

Kansas Reflector stories, www.kansasreflector.com, may be republished online or in print under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
See more at https://kansasreflector.com/2022/04/27/omnibus-education-policy-budget-bill-creeps-toward-finish-line-in-kansas-legislature/.

Legislature delays negotiations of $4 billion Kansas Medicaid contracts until 2023

Bill also restricts governor’s authority to close churches during emergency

by Noah Taborda, Kansas Reflector

Topeka — Kansas Republican legislators moved Tuesday to delay negotiations of the nearly $4 billion contracts for insurance companies managing the state’s Medicaid system until 2023.

The bill blocks all requests for proposals for managed care organizations administering KanCare until at least Jan. 1, 2023. The GOP-controlled Legislature was eager to push the process of awarding the new KanCare contracts until January, after the gubernatorial election.

However, Democrats argued this move allowed no competition and no accountability over the three companies overseeing KanCare. They noted a previous version of the provision heard earlier this year lacked support beyond Republican legislators.

Opponents also argued the delay would force the equivalent of a no-bid, one year extension of contracts with Sunflower Health Plan, United Healthcare and Aetna Better Health of Kansas, even if it is not delineated in the bill.

“What we are doing here is altering the procurement process for just the three MCOs. Why would we do that?” said Rep. Kathy Wolfe Moore, D-Kansas City, Kansas. “That’s kind of a slippery slope. How many other times is the legislature going to get involved in this? This is black and white. This is not right.”

Representatives approved the measure 84 to 38, following the lead of the 26 senators who cast affirmative votes before adjourning the regular session in early April. Gov. Laura Kelly has not yet expressed if she will act to veto the measure, but the measure was a vote shy of a veto-proof majority in the Senate should she choose to do so.

The bill also contains an unrelated section limiting Gov. Kelly’s power to close or restrict capacity at Kansas churches during a state of emergency. Legislators combined both measures into the new bill during a conference committee last month.

Rep. Brenda Landwehr, R-Wichita, insisted the new language would not require an extension of current contracts and argued the proposal would ease concerns from the state’s Medicaid director.

She also questioned Kelly’s desire to have the KanCare system managed by nonprofit entities instead of leaving it open to all. She argued the current for-profit organizations overseeing KanCare have done a good job providing services.

“I don’t care if they are profit or nonprofit,” Rep. Landwehr said. “What I care about is the citizens that we serve get their services and they get them without interruption. That’s why I’m here.”

Rep. Sean Tarwater, R-Stilwell, called into question Kelly’s handling of previous RFPs and issues in other departments. He lambasted the governor for her handling of the strain placed on the state’s beleaguered unemployment system and said he could not be sure she would manage this better.

Rep. Tarwater also noted that Nebraska put out a similar request for proposal a few weeks ago with a deadline of the end of the year.

“It’s a simple process,” he said. “It can be done in a shorter time period, and it can be done properly.”

Gov. Kelly is running for reelection in 2022 and should she lose, control over these KanCare contracts would likely go to presumptive Republican opponent Derek Schmidt. Schmidt, the state’s attorney general, previously weighed in on the issue, saying the Legislature did have the authority to delay this process.

Rep. John Carmichael, who previously ripped this tactic as a corrupt, “pay-to-play” scheme, asked lawmakers to remember the 2014 investigation into whether KanCare contributors paid off lawmakers.

“Where did this idea come from? Who is the proponent of this idea?” the Wichita Republican asked. “No one can explain a good, legitimate reason to do this.”

House and Senate leadership have denied any misconduct in seeking to delay the contracts.

Rep. Carmichael also argued the Kansas constitution already enshrined the ultimate right to practice religion and passing the provision barring the governor from closing churches would simply be duplicative.

However, House majority leader Dan Hawkins, a Wichita Republican, reminded members that the governor did close churches early in the pandemic, thus requiring this measure.

“It’s important for us to do this because she did not listen to the constitution,” Rep. Hawkins said. “Maybe she’ll listen to the statue, maybe she won’t but it will be in two places now.”

Kansas Reflector stories, www.kansasreflector.com, may be republished online or in print under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

See more at https://kansasreflector.com/2022/04/26/legislature-delays-negotiations-of-4-billion-kansas-medicaid-contracts-until-2023/

Legislature deflects Democrats’ maneuvering on clergy reporting mandate, food sales tax

GOP majorities reject attempts to pull reform measures out of committee

by Tim Carpenter and Noah Taborda, Kansas Reflector

Topeka — Democratic Sen. Tom Holland found little support for a motion Tuesday to bring to the full Senate a resolution stuck in committee that would require religious leaders in Kansas to become mandatory reporters of suspected child abuse or neglect.

Holland, of Baldwin City, found no interest among the Republican supermajority to overrule GOP Senate leadership’s view that the “Stop Protecting Pedophile Priests Amendment” didn’t merit consideration. Holland’s motion, which required 24 votes for approval, failed 10-24.

“For far, far too long the Kansas Legislature has looked the other way while pedophile priests, pastors and other religious leaders of faith sexually assaulted Kansas children,” Holland said.

His proposed amendment to the Kansas Constitution would make ordained ministers of religion mandatory reporters along with educators, law enforcement officers and others. His amendment contained no exclusion for communications with individuals during a religious confession of sinfulness.

Holland’s proposal in Senate Concurrent Resolution 1624 was introduced in March, but the Senate Judiciary Committee had taken no action on the measure.

If his motion had drawn support from 24 of the 40 senators, the underlying amendment would have become available for consideration by the full Senate. To make it to statewide ballots, two-thirds of Senate members and two-thirds of House members would have had to vote for it.

In the House, Rep. Jim Gartner, D-Topeka, was author of a comparable unsuccessful motion that would have brought to the House floor a bill repealing the state’s 6.5% sales tax on groceries. Kansas has the nation’s second-highest food sales tax in the nation, and pressure has been building to devote a portion of the state’s tax revenue surplus to reducing or eliminating the food sales tax on groceries.

Gartner invoked a rule triggering the vote on his motion to withdraw House Bill 2487 from the House Taxation Committee. He needed 70 votes to pull it off. The motion was rejected 48-74, with 10 Republicans joining all 38 Democrats in support of Gartner’s idea of breathing life into the bill.

“The majority party struck down direct, immediate tax relief to families,” said House Minority Leader Tom Sawyer, a Wichita Democrat. “We will work with them to keep pressing for a 0% state food tax. We can afford it, Kansans need it, and it’s our job. We’re not finished trying to axe the food tax yet.”

Rep. Dave Baker, a Council Grove Republican who voted for the motion, said the higher food sales tax in Kansas was incentive for shoppers to go to grocery stores in Missouri, where the food sales tax is 1.2%.

“I’m telling you they’re getting crushed in Kansas City,” he said. “It has turned into a weekend adventure for all those people to go over there and shop in Missouri.”

GOP leaders in the Legislature have weighed the possibility of phasing out state portion of food sales tax over three years, but have been cool to giving Kelly a policy victory amid her campaign for re-election.

During a House Republican caucus prior to voting on Gartner’s motion, House Speaker Ron Ryckman of Olathe said this procedural move was an attempt to divide the party.

Rep. Brenda Landwehr, R-Wichita, warned colleagues not to burn through excess cash on hand because when the money evaporated the requests for more spending would remain.

“You’re not gonna want to cut these budgets. What do you think your schools are gonna say?” Landwher said. “I have never and I will not under any circumstances vote for a tax increase because you act irresponsibly.”

Kansas Reflector stories, www.kansasreflector.com, may be republished online or in print under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

See more at https://kansasreflector.com/2022/04/26/kansas-democrats-invoke-special-rules-to-force-votes-on-food-sales-tax-child-abuse-bills/.