Kan. Senate approves $13.6B budget protecting schools, sends it to governor; tax vote awaits

Kan. Senate sends $13.6B budget to governor

TOPEKA, Kan. — Kansas legislators on Monday approved a $13.6 billion budget that protects aid to public schools, sending it to a supportive Democratic Gov. Mark Parkinson, and were voting on whether to give final approval to the tax increase necessary to sustain the spending.

The Senate passed the spending plan 21-17 for the fiscal year beginning July 1. Democrats and moderate Republicans in the House drafted the plan and pushed it through their chamber Saturday. Senators made no changes, allowing it to clear the Legislature.

But the budget won’t balance unless legislators increase taxes. The Senate approved a bill last week to raise the state’s 5.3 percent sales tax to 6.3 percent at the start of the new fiscal year.

The bill was taken up in the House, where the outcome was in doubt late Monday night because the chamber held its voting open and members switched their votes so that both supporters and opponents were prevailing at different times. Results often change during voting, even on major issues.

The Senate’s vote on the budget came as conservative Republicans in the House scrambled to draft an alternative budget-balancing plan that didn’t require higher taxes. They were hoping to block Democrats and moderate Republicans’ efforts to raise the sales tax but conceded after the Senate vote that a tax increase would pass.

“This is an encouraging step, but we understand that there’s a lot of work yet to be done,” said Parkinson spokesman Seth Bundy. “We need to find the revenue to balance this budget.”

The fates of the budget and the tax bill had been tied to at least three other, unrelated proposals. But one of them, a bill designed to help schools in the affluent Kansas City-area suburbs of Johnson County, failed Monday in the House, when members voted 76-41 against it.

House Republican leaders — conservatives who oppose raising taxes — called a meeting of the chamber’s Appropriations Committee, so they could present a new budget plan. Their goal was to persuade some GOP legislators, particularly from Johnson County, to abandon the bipartisan coalition.

Senators responded by taking up the House-passed budget. Sen. Karin Brownlee, a conservative Olathe Republican, argued that senators should wait to see what emerged from the House committee. But Senate Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jay Emler, a Lindsborg Republican, noted that senators were considering what the House actually had passed.

“We didn’t want to delay the process,” said Senate President Steve Morris, a Hugoton Republican, who supported the sales tax increase.

Monday was the 88th day of the Legislature’s annual session, and its leaders hoped to avoid going beyond the 90 days normally scheduled.

Parkinson has told the Republican-controlled Legislature he won’t accept further cuts in aid to public schools, social services and other government programs following multiple rounds of reductions last year. Senate GOP leaders backed his call for higher taxes; the sales tax measure would raise $314 million for the next fiscal year.

“We’ve already made deep cuts,” Morris said. “There was not the sentiment to try to do further cuts.”

House GOP leaders argued the budget can be balanced without raising taxes. They previously suggested a modest cut in aid to public schools, one they said could be offset if Kansas’ 293 school districts tapped reserve funds or raised property taxes.

The Appropriations Committee worked on a plan that would have avoided cutting aid to public schools and raised new revenue by selling state property, such as unused land and buildings.

The debate was complicated by some legislators’ desire for a new program of highway, bridge and other projects, following successful programs enacted in 1989 and 1999. The Senate has approved a bill for a 10-year, $8.2 billion program, but House members have yet to review it.

Also in the mix was a proposed nursing home “bed tax” of up to $1,950 a year. It would raise about $30 million a year, but more importantly, it could attract an additional $56 million in federal funds. All the state and federal funds would be returned to the homes to offset past budget cuts. The proposal had cleared the Senate and awaited a vote in the House.

Bipartisan House coalition’s budget is House Sub for SB 572. Sales tax bill is Senate Sub for HB 2360. School finance bill is House Sub for SB 74. Proposed “bed tax” is Senate Sub for Sub for HB 2320. Gambling measure is Senate Sub for HB 2180.

On the Net:

Kansas Legislature: www.kslegislature.org