June 2010

June 24, 2010
(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers June 21, 2010)

Evening salaries up

For all the talk of those “big government jobs” and fiscal profligacy by state government, there are thousands of state workers who are making less money than they could if they worked for a private employer.

In a tough economy, when state tax revenues are low and legislators spent most of the 2010 session trying to find things to cut to save money, it’s interesting to know that the state budget included some $8.5 million in State General Fund money to help bring up those below-market rate salaries.

It’s the right thing to do. There’s really no good reason that just because you work for the state, doing the same job that a neighbor who works for a private company does, your work is worth 20 percent or 30 percent less than your neighbor. A job is a job.

It is probably surprising that the $8.5 million in State General Fund money, and about the same amount in other state revenue such as fees or federal revenues on some jobs, doesn’t come anywhere close to evening up the salary disparities. It’ll take about four more years to even things out.

And while giving raises—some just 2.5 percent, some up to 15 percent—seems like it’s just going to cost the state more money that is always tight, there’s a flip side that probably is worth considering.
Because the state pay for some jobs is so far below what those workers could receive working for private employers, the state becomes a training ground for some employees, which probably isn’t a bad deal, but which means that once the employees learn their jobs thoroughly, they can move from the state to private industry at higher salaries.

At some point that makes the state less efficient, and probably means that in some specialties, Kansas is hiring more workers than it would need if state employment wasn’t a “first stop” for those entering the labor force.

Spreading that $8.5 million in raises among thousands of employees wasn’t easy. It’s not just a matter of sprinkling raises evenly and hoping that in a few years everyone will be at market level wages. It’s negotiated between the state and its employees—and that’s why some to-market raises were just 2.5 percent while others were 15 percent.

All that was done pretty quietly, from learning what comparable jobs in private industry pay—employers really don’t want their competitors to learn what wages they are paying—to deciding which employee groups will see raises and which will wait another year or two to see their salaries improve.

Oh, and that’s if the Legislature continues its to-market program through the next two or three legislative sessions…a risk that is ever-present in tough economic times for the state. If the program isn’t continued, well, Kansas will continue to have thousands of employees working for less than what private industry has determined their labors are worth.

We’ll see which way that goes, won’t we…

June 17, 2010
(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers June 14, 2010)

A free ride?

There’s an old joke that ended with the punch-line “There’s nothing as good as being shot at…and missed.”

Now, there’s not a lot of gunfire around the Statehouse, but probably the closest we come here is “there is nothing as good as filing for reelection and not having an opponent.”

Well, that happened last week, 39 times.

Of those 39 who face no major party opposition for election to the Kansas House of Representatives, all but two are incumbents who left hundreds of recorded votes behind them to be judged on. Apparently not a single registered voter from a major party in their districts was upset enough to challenge them on the ballot.

Actually, only one of the 39 has any opposition at all—barring any write-in campaigns—and that is a challenge by a Libertarian candidate to Rep. Sharon Schwartz, R-Washington. But historically in Kansas non-major party candidates don’t tend to win Statehouse seats.

The two non-incumbents with the free ride to the Kansas House of Representatives?

One is Ponka-We Victors, a Democrat from Wichita and former campaign treasurer of Rep. Delia Garcia, D-Wichita, who on filing deadline day withdrew from the ballot so Victors could file in her place. That’s the old Sedgwick County switcheroo, something Republicans have done several times, but this was the first switcheroo pulled by Democrats.

The other is Reynaldo Mesa, Garden City, who filed after the incumbent, Rep. Jeff Whitham, R-Garden City, didn’t file for reelection.
So, who are the 15 Democrats and 24 Republicans who get the apparent free rides into the House next session?

Democrats: Bill Fairborn, D-Garnett; Jerry Williams, D-Chanute; Louis Ruiz, Tom Burroughs, Valdenia Winn, and  Mike Peterson, all D-Kansas City; Barbara Ballard and Paul Davis, both D-Lawrence; Harold Lane, D-Topeka; Jerry Henry, D-Cummings; Ed Trimmer, D-Winfield; Melody McCray Miller and Ponka-We Victors, both D-Wichita; Jan Pauls, D-Hutchinson, and  Eber Phelps, D-Hays. 
Republicans: Jene Vickrey, R-Louisburg; Richard Proehl, R-Parsons; Virgil Peck, R-Tyro; Rob Olson, R-Olathe; Ray Merrick, R-Stilwell; Ron Worley, R-Lenexa;  Marvin Kleeb, R-Overland Park; Rocky Fund, R-Hoyt; Richard Carlson, R-St. Marys; Clark Shultz, R-Lindsborg;  David Crum, R-Augusta; Kasha Kelley, R-Arkansas City; Steve Brunk, R-Bel Aire; Steve Huebert, R-Valley Center; Dan Kerschen, R-Garden Plain; Aaron Jack, R-Andover; Mario Goico, R-Wichita; Sharon Schwartz, R-Washington; Elaine Bowers, R-Concordia; Bob Bethell, R-Alden; Mitch Holmes, R-St. John; Larry Powell and Reynaldo Mesa, both R-Garden City, and Carl Holmes, R-Liberal.

Now, those are free rides, but the trick for those un-challenged candidates is to remember to campaign…even when they probably don’t absolutely, positively have to.

It’s a little like bringing your spouse flowers (or, alternatively, maybe a new TV remote control) when you really don’t have to. It’s nice, it’s considerate and it shows you care.

So, at that 4th of July parades full of candidates, those free-riders probably better be there, tossing candy to kids and handing pamphlets to grown-ups just to show that they’re not taking any vote for granted.

That’s how candidates not only get reelected, but maybe, just maybe, get another free ride in 2012.

June 10, 2010
(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers June 7, 2010)

Keep your hands out of the cookie jar!

The state is about to close the lid on the cookie jar—maybe…

The cookie jar is the Kansas Department of Transportation, which in recent fiscal years Kansas governors have reached into to pull out money to run the rest of government.

Last year alone, Gov. Mark Parkinson reached in for about $100 million that otherwise would have been spent by KDOT for things like salt and sand for icy highways, road maintenance and repairs. It was handy, money just sitting there from dedicated funding streams like the state motor fuels tax and a share of the Kansas sales tax.

One of the nicer aspects of raiding the KDOT budget for that money is that it could be done with little in the way of yelping from KDOT, because the Secretary of the Kansas Department of Transportation works for the governor. See how easy it is to raid the cookie jar when the keeper of that jar doesn’t wail and cause a big fuss?

Well, there’s a pretty good lid—and lock for that lid—in the newly enacted 10-year transportation program law.

It’s a provision that allows KDOT to issue bonds for road maintenance and repair with the provision that a maximum of 18 percent of KDOT’s revenues be spent on interest and principal payments to pay off those bonds.

Key is for the Secretary of Transportation to certify just how much revenue—federal funds, sales taxes, vehicle registration fees and motor fuel taxes—KDOT expects to receive in the year starting July 1, and then issue bonds that 18 percent of that amount will make the payments on.

See what happens here? Especially in an election year?

It means that the18 percent of the KDOT budget—the part that provides jobs for the dozens of contractors, materials suppliers and such that feed off KDOT projects—are essentially protected.

Would you want to be the governor who takes money from KDOT so that it can’t pay off its bonds? Do you want to be the governor who even if you need a little more cash would risk wrecking the state’s credit ratings? Do you want highway contractors and their employees picketing the Statehouse during your term in office?

Probably not.

That’s the relatively clever lock on the cookie jar that the Kansas Legislature has passed to keep the transportation program ticking along for the next decade even if whoever is governor next year wants to reach into that KDOT cookie jar.

Key of course is that determination—likely shortly after the July 1 start of the new state fiscal year—of just what that 18 percent amounts to, and getting bonds issued so that it takes 18 percent of revenues to pay them off.

See how this works? It’s virtually an intelligence test for KDOT officials, one that if used swiftly can protect what will amount to about $1 billion in transportation funds for projects.

Yes, we’ll be watching this one, and so will contractors, laborers, suppliers, cities and counties wanting state help with a high local-interest project.

June 3, 2010
(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers May 31, 2010)

The real hammer

Just think back a moment here, and recall that it’s fun to watch a small child play with those brightly colored plastic hammers that are part of the “little tyke’s tool kit” that seems to wind up in every home where there is a toddler.

They tap on the floor, on the little pegs that come with the kit, and they have a great time.
And have you noticed that nobody gives a little child a full-sized, heavy steel and wood hammer? The reason is pretty obvious. Think of the damage that the well-intentioned gift could cause to your coffee table or cat.

Strange stuff for a column about state government and politics? Not necessarily.

Gov. Mark Parkinson last week line-item vetoed from the just-adjourned legislative session a provision that is relatively similar.

It was a paragraph that ordered all school districts to use a uniform system of accounting for every dime that the districts receive or spend. Now, that doesn’t sound too onerous, does it?  Just bookkeeping and everyone wants school districts to keep their books straight so the public can tell whether a district is spending its (that’s our) money on things that sound reasonable for the business of educating children.

The problem? The culture of the Legislature vs. that phrase “local control.”

Running a school district in a crowded suburb with thousands of pupils is a lot different than running a school district where in 200 square miles of territory, there may be fewer than 200 students. 

magine that the sparsely populated district is going to spend more on bussing students to school than a tight urban district where kids can walk to school? Or that the cost of transporting the basketball team is going to be higher when you have to drive 50 miles to the game rather than just past the next shopping center?

Well, that’s where this sounds-good-uniform-accounts idea can cause mischief in the hands of legislators, just like the real hammer in the tiny hands of a toddler.

The real danger here? Averaging.  That’s something that legislators are good at. Take the highest spending on transportation in a school district and average that with the lowest spending on transportation, and you wind up with an average cost that probably doesn’t fit any school district.
Or, take utilities, or text book costs or administrative salaries, and average them.

It’s not a big leap to figure that lawmakers from across the state are going to want to average virtually every category of expense and make that average the official state number that school districts can be forced to spend.

Averaging is a real-life hammer for school districts, and often the first tool in the box that lawmakers reach for when they want to do something about the cost of public education. That’s just how the Legislature is, how it’s been for decades.

Sounds odd, but maybe—just to be safe—Parkinson took the real hammer away from the kids you elect to the Legislature.

We just might have saved the coffee table…