In the “good old days,” it was often said that when the legislature finally adjourned, everyone felt safer. Well, they have adjourned, but I know there are good people all across our state who feel anything but safe as a result of the most recent late-night governing session by the Kansas Legislature. I also know there were many who wanted them to try longer and harder to get the budget more acceptable. Some had hoped, for example, that delaying state transfers to KPERS could be avoided, worrying that the delay would lead to the transfer never taking place—which, frankly, is a legitimate fear. But, from my experience, if they had failed Sunday night (Monday morning) to get the necessary votes in one house or the other on the budget, the follow-up product would very likely have been worse. Why? Because the leadership would have found ways to get the attention of key legislators who didn’t support what they, the majority leadership, had put together and that would have led to taking away, not adding, to the budget.
They are already letting the Governor finish the cutting and running the risk of their negative balance budget being declared unconstitutional. Included now is punishing research universities with a higher percentage cut than the other Regent institutions. Sure, the dollar cut being larger for our larger institutions might seem to make sense for some. But the specific way it was done, penalizing institutions for bringing federal research dollars to Kansas, boggles any sane person's mind. The lack of understanding for the value of the research itself, much less the economic value of such dollars to the state, is hard to comprehend and certainly hard to defend. Now, as always, there were those who fought against all this, but in the end, the majority ruled—a majority we have a chance to address in this election year.
In the big picture, one key thing to understand is that there will only be one really good chance to get this done right, and for now, the votes are just not there to do what is best for Kansas. Half measures will not get it done. That is why the defeat of restoring some of the LLC tax cuts on Saturday was fine with me. Getting it right starts now—with the hard work to achieve the positive results we need in the August primary and then in the November general election. At that point, there can be some real positive expectations. We should be able to at least stop the digging and the passage of additional acts of ignorance, and who knows, there might be some other areas where positive consensus emerges. But not even then will there be the power to begin the real restoration of Kansas Government. For only in 2018 will we have the opportunity to bring back positive leadership to the second floor of the capitol, and then in January 2019, we have the chance to really start moving in a positive direction. That is a long wait and it’s unfortunate that rolling back all the damage done in the past few years will take so long, but it is the only realistic path we have towards restoring Kansas to its proud past.
They are already letting the Governor finish the cutting and running the risk of their negative balance budget being declared unconstitutional. Included now is punishing research universities with a higher percentage cut than the other Regent institutions. Sure, the dollar cut being larger for our larger institutions might seem to make sense for some. But the specific way it was done, penalizing institutions for bringing federal research dollars to Kansas, boggles any sane person's mind. The lack of understanding for the value of the research itself, much less the economic value of such dollars to the state, is hard to comprehend and certainly hard to defend. Now, as always, there were those who fought against all this, but in the end, the majority ruled—a majority we have a chance to address in this election year.
In the big picture, one key thing to understand is that there will only be one really good chance to get this done right, and for now, the votes are just not there to do what is best for Kansas. Half measures will not get it done. That is why the defeat of restoring some of the LLC tax cuts on Saturday was fine with me. Getting it right starts now—with the hard work to achieve the positive results we need in the August primary and then in the November general election. At that point, there can be some real positive expectations. We should be able to at least stop the digging and the passage of additional acts of ignorance, and who knows, there might be some other areas where positive consensus emerges. But not even then will there be the power to begin the real restoration of Kansas Government. For only in 2018 will we have the opportunity to bring back positive leadership to the second floor of the capitol, and then in January 2019, we have the chance to really start moving in a positive direction. That is a long wait and it’s unfortunate that rolling back all the damage done in the past few years will take so long, but it is the only realistic path we have towards restoring Kansas to its proud past.
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