April 2000

April 27, 2000
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers April 24, 2000)

There was a moment last week, when the House Appropriations Committee, furious that Kansas Juvenile Justice Authority chief Albert Murray didn't seem to be listening to lawmakers, that the veto session of the Year 2000 Kansas Legislature promised to stretch on for days and days.

And then, on a Friday afternoon, House Minority Leader Jim Garner, D-Coffeyville, held a little meeting in a fifth floor lounge of the Statehouse with key Democrats on the committee and Murray. Within minutes after the secret huddle, a deal was struck.

But we only know one side of the deal, and that side was a pledge by Garner that he would put his full weight and the weight of his 48 Democratic votes in the House behind a $34-million initiative to build a maximum security juvenile prison just north of Topeka.

It wasn't a deal that House Democrats were eager to embrace, but it was necessary to the final wrap-up of this legislative session. Nearly every session for the past quarter century, there has been a similar deal, whether it was over state employee pay, state aid to elementary and secondary
education, or whatever.

But it is one of those deals that makes possible the adjournment of the Legislature, and typically, the broker of that deal gets to choose something that is important to his party caucus, and to see that deal matched by leadership of the House.

This year, it appears that the deal comes with two paybacks. One is an ever-closer watch over Murray and his agency, which in the past three years has cost the state more than $150 million. The second appears to be a bill that most of the public doesn't even know exists.

It's a worker compensation bill, one of those measures that is fought out not between legislators, but between representatives of labor unions and management, and brought signed, sealed and delivered to the Legislature, with the clear instruction that no harm is going to come to legislators who vote for it, and that both labor organizations and the state's business community will be watching closely lawmakers who vote against it.

There are two keys to this year's worker comp deal. One is a promise by Democrats not to challenge in floor debate the decades-old concept that, except in cases of malice or just foolish unbusinesslike conduct on the part of employers, that worker comp is the exclusive remedy available for those who are injured or killed in the workplace. The other is that the high-profile debate possible on that measure, which in the past two years has featured the DeBruce Grain Company, whose terminal near Wichita exploded two years ago killing seven workers and causing permanent injuries, is not put in the spotlight.

Major concession that backers of labor receive? It's a little wrinkle in the schedule of payments to survivors of those killed in industrial accidents.

It gives the survivors a quick cash $40,000, which allows them to stabilize their households after a tragedy, to pay pressing bills, to be a little less financially squeezed while they consider settlement offers from the insurance company that insures the workplace owners.

It's a breather. And it doesn't seem like much of a concession, but that initial shot of cash means that survivors of a worker killed in a workplace accident don't have to try to make their best deal possible while the water company is calling threatening to turn off water, the credit card companies are phoning the home, and cash flow problems threaten home and family.

Surprisingly, the $40,000 is not "new" money put into settlements of losses, it is merely the speeding-up of payments while the shock of a death of a breadwinner is absorbed. That's at least part of what Garner wanted in return for his caucus' support for a bond issue that will include $34 million for a juvenile prison.

Garner has promised virtually no debate on the work comp bill. House Speaker Robin Jennison, R-Healy, is wary but will agree to at least start debate and test Garner's control of his caucus. It's early in the week. Let's see what happens...

April 20, 2000
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers April 17, 2000)

The "brochure session" of 2000 is nearly over; just a handful of days next week to wrap up loose ends, and already, us Statehouse "observers" or folks who get a dab of office space there in the public interest are wondering who's going to claim what piece of the session as a clear victory.

And yes, we're more interested in who becomes Speaker of the House than President of the Senate, because it's the House where the big fight is going to be in 2002 over reapportionment. The choices in the House at this point appear more starkly "urban" and "rural" than in the Senate, where the members all fancy themselves "cosmopolitan."

In the House, the selling of the session of 2000 has already begun. Oh, and that means, of course, whether anyone can use what happened or didn't happen this year as a basis for hanging onto political power within the House of Representatives.

Republican No. 2 and Republican No. 3 have been on the road. House Majority Leader Kent Glasscock, Manhattan, and Speaker pro tem Doug Mays, Topeka, (Nos. 2 and 3, respectively) have already completed a sweep of the state's newspaper and radio station editorial offices, putting their spin on how they were able to wind down the session and restore order to the state. To hear them tell it, as reported by the editors who spent a little time with them, there are some big issues ahead, but a lot of good done already, and if if the Legislature would just write wrap up the budget, it would have been a good session.

House Democrat No. 1, that's Minority Leader Jim Garner, Coffeyville, has taken a spin around some of the northeast Kansas media, and has generally been claiming that Democrats, though outnumbered in the House, are fast enough on their feet to form alliances on individual issues that have caused good public policy to occur. House Democrat No. 1 is likely to remain House Democrat No. 1 next session. Oh, there's some bickering within the Democratic caucus, as there usually is, but nothing serious.

And, except for the lawsuit in Federal district court at the end, Democrats don't have a lot to do with reapportionment.

Now, with the dust settled on most of the session, you'd imagine that House Republican No. 1, that's Speaker Robin Jennison, of Healy, would be out touting whatever good happened this session, too. But Jennison, besides some talk to local papers out west and a foray to the big wild turkey hunt last week, has been pretty quiet. He generally makes a trip around the state, editorial office by editorial office, after the session is finally gaveled to an end probably sometime next weekend.

It's going to take a week or so to find out whether Jennison decided to make his newspaper-to-newspaper campaign too late, after all the glory has been claimed by Glasscock and Mays, and Jennison can be credited for merely the mechanics of closing down the session.

Why is all this important? We're talking setting up the scene that will elect the next Speaker of the House, and while the speaker can occasionally toss a bone or two to his or her home district, the real key is that the Speaker will preside over the session where the House and Senate and congressional districts are reapportioned by population in the year 2002.

Now, that's going to be important. The choices are "country-boy" Jennison, or "city boy" Glasscock, and there is almost certain to be a "city social conservative" candidate from Wichita. That ought to give you an indication who gets the "leaners" when the census numbers come out and are run through the computers to determine, on a first, mechanical cut, where district lines should be drawn.

And while selection of a House Speaker is something that newspapers will speculate on in December, the selection process is one that involves just the GOP caucus of the House, and even freshmen members tell their local editors that the selection process is party business, not public business.

Now, Railsters aren't betting anything that Jennison will be elected Speaker again. And in fact, Railsters won't bet that Jennison will be the next legislator from his district, not that he could be beaten there, but because he hasn't filed for reelection yet. And there is a big difference between being Speaker and being a rank and filer at the back of the chamber.

 

April 13, 2000
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers April 10, 2000)

A little haircut that Gov. Bill Graves planned for the Kansas Public Employees Retirement System became one of the hot-button issues of the main session of the Kansas Legislature, and may become one of the hottest legislative campaign issues of the season.

For the past several years, national polls have rated Democrats "better" in intent to save the federal Social Security fund than Republicans, and the issue, on a state level, now presents Democrats with a chance to claim that only their insistence, their willingness to wreck the state's budget if
necessary, saved the KPERS fund from disaster.

It is an issue that Kansans haven't had a chance to personalize right down to the Kansas House and Senate district level, and it is an issue that frankly intrigues Statehouse hangers-on who are looking forward to the general election in November.

What started out as a literal attempt to shake the loose change out of the sofa cushions by Gov. Bill Graves, to freeze for one year the state's contribution to the retirement fund--amounting to about $7 million--ballooned into an emotional, not-give-one-inch issue for Democrats.

The trim of state contributions actually didn't threaten any retiree's monthly KPERS pension check. It was intended to be a one-year-only hiccup that dealt with such a small amount of money from the state's general fund that it could be lost in a rounding error.

But House and Senate Democrats saw that magic word "pensions" and not only lambasted Graves and legislative Republicans, but joined in an effort by some disaffected Republicans in the House to derail the state's budget until the money was restored.

In a $10-billion KPERS fund, the governor's proposal to hold contributions steady instead of increasing state payments into the fund amounted to withholding 10 cents from a $100 fund. About one-tenth of one percent.

That's rounding-error territory.

But it became a tripwire that Democrats believe will be a key for the fall elections. And, they may well be right.

The reason is very simple. On the doorstep during this fall's campaign, Democrats will be able to say simply that they prevented Gov. Graves from wrecking the state retirement system that more than 25,000 Kansans receive pensions from and that more than 250,000 Kansans pay into. That's serious stuff. And it takes about 15 seconds to make that point that Graves, short of money for the state budget, reached into the pension fund.

Republicans following Democrats to the same doorstep can explain away that allegation, but it is going to take several minutes to do so...while kids are running in the house, the TV is blaring, maybe while the family is getting ready for dinner.

Advantage: Democrats. They can start more political fires in 15 seconds than Republicans are likely to be allowed time to put out.

That makes KPERS a perfect election-year issue, one that is easier to present than to explain away.
Now, what happened, when the dust settled from the first 85 days of the 2000 edition of the Kansas Legislature? Well, the governor's "haircut" of the main pension fund was averted, partly by juggling expenditures through the budget, partly by discovery of a $100-million trove of federal funds which Kansas believes it can grab, and partly because the state is expecting to see about $13 million less in demands for public education financing (a combination of fewer schoolchildren statewide and higher receipts from the 20-mill school property tax levy).

But do you have time to hear how the system, which was never really endangered, was rescued by obscure financial and budgetary tricks, or do you just have time to hear that Republicans wanted to wreck KPERS and Democrats wouldn't let them?

Railsters are predicting for at least the small portion of Kansas voters who are going to see a candidate for the Legislature on their doorstep, Republicans are going to take a beating on the issue. KPERS is as good a bogeyman as Democrats have been handed in recent years.

Railsters will be waiting to see what they can do with it.

 

April 6, 2000
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers April 3, 2000)

Well, we're coming to that last couple weeks of the legislative session where the easiest course of action for many legislators is to start dismissing everything that they don't care for as "just politics" so they can go home.

And us old-timers around the Statehouse continue to be amazed that the simple phrase "just politics" is somehow supposed to taint every action that doesn't lead the Legislature to a swift adjournment.

The point is, of course, that politics is what legislators do at the Statehouse. Nobody says, "well, that's just legislating" or "how come everyone doesn't agree with (insert any noun or pronoun, such as "us Republicans" or "party leaders" or "us farmers" or "us western Kansans") because that would sound foolish.

See, the Legislature has spent weeks getting to the time when nearly every important issue and a lot of smaller, housekeeping-type issues are about to be decided. And the decision, not surprisingly, requires some finesse, or politics. If you are in the majority party, and have the votes to pass legislation, then it's time to pass legislation. But even the majority party needs some help, and the price of that help is often an amendment, or a motion to suspend the rules to do things faster, or a roll call vote where someone has to go on record as voting against something nice, or alternatively, voting for something that's icky.

It would be nicer, more polite, of course, if everyone just agreed to agree to everything. It would be very polite. It would be very efficient. But it wouldn't be what most voters sent their legislators to Topeka to do. They were sent to Topeka to wheedle and cajole and nudge their fellow legislators into agreeing with them.

Any districts out there who voted to send a cheerleader to Topeka?

Probably not. Most self-respecting voters hoped they were sending a quarterback to Topeka, a go-to boy or girl who could force a play, who could pick up a yard or two by diving over the line, and by not
fumbling.

We're coming to the handful of days when even a handful of legislators can demand that a bill be altered slightly, or that a bill that they believe is important to someone can be put before the full House or Senate for debate and maybe passed.

And those days just before the 2 1/2 week break after adjournment become themselves a tool for getting legislation considered.

And the handful of days after the return from adjournment, for the veto session, also becomes a tool for getting legislation passed. Because about this time of year, every year, legislators get antsy to get home and reacquaint themselves with friends and family and pets.

Many are more interested in wrapping up the session than playing a little politics with issues. That's when "playing politics" becomes another valuable tool. And those who are willing to play politics can gain ground, and those who merely want to go home lose ground.
***
Want to watch closely one of those issues that will bring the "playing politics" cry to mouths of dozens of legislators, and probably the governor?

Watch a simple little amendment added to the capital improvements bill in the House last week. It merely says that the state will not authorize issuance of bonds for a prison without the full Legislature voting in favor of it. It means that the Legislature can't delegate to the State Finance Council, a group of legislative leaders plus the governor, the authority to issue bonds to build a new prison or expand an existing prison.

Seems, well, almost like one of those decisions that the full Legislature ought to have to make, doesn't it? If the state is going to authorize a prison be built, and that a stream of revenue be added to
the Department of Corrections budget to pay for that prison, well, it sorta sounds like one of those decisions that we send legislators to Topeka to make.

But it's going to slow things down a bit. And if we can't wait until next session to start building that prison, it means the governor is going to have to call the Legislature back into special summer session to consider the bond issue, and that's unpopular. But if it isn't a big enough deal to call the Legislature back into session, is it really a big enough deal to let someone else decide?

Hmmm....Sounds like politics again.