Category: Kansas Legislature

State Finance Council approves $14.9 million in additional funds for Kansas COVID-19 testing

by Noah Taborda, Kansas News Service

Topeka — Kansas legislative leaders and the governor Thursday approved $14.9 million to extend state testing programs through the end of the year.

With COVID-19 cases rising in Kansas and the omicron variant looming, the Strengthening People and Revitalizing Kansas Executive Committee requested the funds last month to maintain testing capacity across the state. The surge of cases from the delta variant sapped the budget, said Lt. Gov. David Toland, chairman of the SPARK executive committee.

Toland reaffirmed to the State Finance Council the importance of maintaining testing during a time when case numbers are climbing.

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment’s “employer and community testing programs, which were set up early in the pandemic response, are really critical to ensuring our management of the pandemic,” Toland said. “It’s especially important to continue this testing and make sure that it’s available across our state, both for those who are experiencing symptoms or those that have potential exposures to COVID-19 in their communities.”

The finance council — made up of Senate and House leadership, as well as Gov. Laura Kelly — moved unanimously to approve the additional funds. The money would come from recouped COVID-19 relief funds and maintain testing through Dec. 31.

Senate Minority Leader Dinah Sykes, a Lenexa Democrat, raised concerns she had heard from some Kansans about accessing affordable testing.

“I know we had different places where residents could go, and some of those are charging like $120 for testing,” Sykes said. “Will that offset that cost, so people are not having to pay that much?”

Myron Gunsalus, director of KDHE labs, said some sites that previously were using funds from KDHE labs to provide free testing may have added fees. While the newly allocated funds will not provide expanded testing capacity, it would ensure free community testing continues.

Businesses previously participating in the testing program would also be eligible for testing.

“This does extend free testing across Kansas, either through antigen testing with our community partners or through our community site testing sites,” Gunsalus said. “That includes about eight to 10 mass testing sites, basically like a drive up or a walk-up site that (KDHE) will actually man as one of the ways to save some money and yet maintain a public-facing free testing option.”

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/2021/12/09/state-finance-council-approves-14-9-million-in-additional-funds-for-kansas-covid-19-testing/.

Residents urge legislative redistricting committee to keep Wyandotte, Johnson counties together

Wyandotte County residents on Tuesday evening told a legislative redistricting committee they wanted Wyandotte County to stay together with Johnson County in the 3rd Congressional District.

The legislative redistricting listening tour went to Bonner Springs and Stilwell on Tuesday evening to hear comments from residents. It was the second round of redistricting listening tour meetings. Committee members listened to comments by video from Topeka, while residents made comments from their communities.

Connie Brown Collins, a resident of the Welborn area of Kansas City, Kansas, implored the committee to “keep Wyandotte County whole.”

After census results came in, it was found the 3rd District is about 57,816 persons over the ideal population of 734,470, about 7 percent over the ideal, according to Jordan Milholland of the Kansas Legislative Research Department. The 3rd District will have to give the extra population to another district or districts in the state.

Collins, who is with the Voting Rights Network of Kansas, said that western and southern townships in Johnson County could be moved into another congressional district. Currently the 3rd District includes Wyandotte, Johnson and parts of Miami County.

Collins echoed a speaker at the Stilwell location, Amy Carter of Overland Park, who said areas including DeSoto and Louisburg might be moved into another district. The most populous parts of Johnson and Wyandotte counties should be kept together in the 3rd District, while the more rural parts of Johnson County could be moved into another district, Carter suggested.

Also speaking was Dr. Bruce Carter of Overland Park, who said the 3rd District’s diversity needs to be maintained. He noted the district was winnable by either party now. He asked that the voters be allowed to make their decisions and choose their representative; the representative should not be determined by the lines drawn by the legislative committee.

“We voters should be making that decision,” he said.

Collins said Wyandotte and Johnson counties share employment and transportation systems, and as part of the Greater Kansas City area should remain in the same district.

Henry Chamberlain, Bonner Springs, talked about diversity in Wyandotte County, and the difference between rural and urban areas. It would probably be impossible for a representative from rural Kansas to fully understand and represent his interests in an urban area, he said.

Chamberlain told the committee he had expected to be one of the people funding litigation in case the district’s boundary lines were gerrymandered. He urged the committee to keep Wyandotte and Johnson counties together in the 3rd District. He told the committee that they had the ability to avoid delay, litigation and expenditure of public resources, plus there was the opportunity to restore the faith of Kansans in their Legislature.

Alex Overman, who lives in Lenexa and works in Wyandotte County, offered several redistricting maps for the committee. One of them, for example, kept all the cities intact and together, while removing Gardner, DeSoto and Edgerton from the 3rd District.

“If we break up Johnson and Wyandotte counties, someone’s going to be misrepresented,” he said.

Mike Taylor, a retired public relations director for the Unified Government, was representing the Voter Rights Network of Wyandotte County.

He told the committee that Wyandotte and Johnson counties are not only neighbors, they have strong community interests. They share sewer systems, transportation networks, infrastructure networks, and a lot is dependent on federal funding, Taylor said. It’s important to have one federal representative to fight for that funding, he said. Twenty-two mayors in both counties meet on a monthly basis.

Taylor felt that it would be pretty easy to solve the redistricting challenges unless there is an attempt to gerrymander, and “we urge you not to do that.”

After the committee has drawn the maps, Taylor asked it to hold another round of public hearings.

Cassandra Woolworth of Johnson County said the biggest issue was keeping Wyandotte and Johnson counties together.

“We don’t want gerrymandering,” she said. “We don’t want any kind of slanted political view. Aren’t we done with that yet, don’t we already have enough partisan politics.”

She recalled the courts had to decide the issue in 2012. There had been a proposal to put Wyandotte County in with a district in western Kansas.

“I don’t want history to repeat itself,” she said.

“Gerrymandering is cheating,” she said. “We teach our children not to cheat. We can’t show them that cheating is the way to win.”

State Rep. Chris Croft, R-8th Dist., chair of the House redistricting committee, conducted the legislative redistricting listening tour.

State Rep. Tom Burroughs, D-33rd Dist., is the House redistricting committee ranking minority member.

The committee also is still taking written comments at kslegresearch.org.

The listening tour from Bonner Springs and Stilwell is online at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8haWh3w7Ts.

Redistricting meeting to be held Tuesday

A listening tour for the House Committee on Redistricting and Senate Committee on Redistricting will take place from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 30, at the Bonner Springs City Hall.

The meeting is open to the public. It will be in the City Council Meeting Room, 200 E. 3rd St., Bonner Springs.

Listening tour meetings will receive public comments concerning the redistricting process.

Comments should be related to the congressional district for which each meeting is designated. The Bonner Springs meeting is in the 3rd Congressional District.

Committee members will attend virtually. Conferees may provide testimony either virtually or at a designated public location in cities across the state.

There will be the opportunity for the public to give oral testimony, with the meetings livestreamed online.

The committees also will accept written testimony. Written testimony will be accepted at any time before the beginning of the 2022 legislative session. Oral and written testimony becomes a public record and will be published on the Legislature’s website.

For instructions on submitting written testimony, visit http://www.kslegresearch.org/KLRD-web/Committees/House-Senate-Redistricting-Committees_November_2021.html.

The meeting will be livestreamed on the Legislature’s YouTube webpage at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_0NO-Pb96CFABvxDwXAq8A.