November 2001

Nov. 29, 2001
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Nov. 26, 2001)

A dab of hallway gossip

There is some interesting Statehouse hallway gossip going on that may--but just as likely, may not--turn out to be important for the next legislative session.

And for those people who have real jobs to do and don't just spend their time hanging out at the Statehouse, here's the hot stuff that is being talked about by grown-ups who were elected to represent us.

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One little rumor making the rounds is that conservative Republicans in the House are talking among themselves about the possibility of ousting House Speaker Kent Glasscock, R-Manhattan, from the top leadership job of the chamber.

It's believed to be a way to embarrass Glasscock, who is now the lieutenant governor running-mate of Attorney General Carla Stovall for the GOP nomination for governor next August.

Upside? Conservatives say it would be a ringing rejection of the Stovall-Glasscock ticket, one that would probably cause even moderate Republican primary election voters to question the legislative leadership skills of the team that wants to govern the state for the next four years.

Downside? The silverbacks among the conservatives say instead of removing Glasscock from the legislative spotlight, better to keep him there where they can frustrate him and make him appear unable to manage the affairs of the House. And they can probably muster the votes to accomplish that.

What damage does that do to the Stovall-Glasscock ticket? Probably not much for the average Kansan, but probably some damage among Republican primary election voters, who tend to be more conservative than the state as a whole.

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Gov. Bill Graves is telling insiders that he won't put together a spending recision bill. That's a bill that pares down appropriations made by the last Legislature, and slows the spending of money already appropriated for the current fiscal year. A recision bill is viewed as a businesslike thing to do, sort of like patching the hole in the bucket from which state funds are spent.

For a year in which revenue receipts--that's your tax payments--are expected to drop about $113 million below what the Legislature has already approved in spending, not doing a recision bill means spending continues until at least the time the Legislature reconvenes in mid-January. It puts pressure on the Legislature, which by that time is more than halfway through the fiscal year, to raise revenues somehow, either through tax increases or by something else, like approving slot machines at pari-mutuel racetracks.

It's a squeeze play that might force the Legislature into new taxes...or which might force some really quick-and-dirty spending cuts by legislators. Those cuts are going to be pretty ugly when lawmakers stand for reelection.

Who wins this game? Well, it's probably too serious to be labeled a "game" but the strategy to continue spending money that revenues won't cover could go either way. It probably depends on what the Legislature decides to cut from spending already under way. But the key is that between spending on education and on social services for the poor, nearly 75 percent of spending from tax resources is accounted for, and just a quarter of all spending programs are left to hack away at.

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Independent family farmers continue to push for legislation that would protect them from the people who buy their hogs and cattle, but the Legislature is mostly unsure whether it ought to inconvenience the people with the checkbooks.

An early possibility? Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Derrick Schmidt, R-Independence, is talking about a project in which senior law students at the University of Kansas help farmers interpret the contracts they are offered by packers so nobody gets surprised by what they've agreed to.

It might be helpful, and Schmidt believes it might just interest some law school students in ag law, an area where the state's expertise is pretty thin now...

Nov. 22, 2001
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Nov. 19, 2001)

New possibilities for life as we know it

It's not often that you hear one of those little phrases that sets you thinking of a whole new bunch of possibilities for life as we know it here in the Kansas Statehouse.

Last one we can recall clearly is "right turn on red." That phrase changed life in Kansas almost as significantly as the invention of those little plastic lids for hot coffee cups so we don't spill hot coffee on our laps.

Well, this new little phrase was from former State Rep. Jack Wempe, D-Little River, who left the Legislature and was promptly placed on the State Board of Regents.

His phrase: "Competency-based exit."

Wempe was talking about a grand scheme of coordination of technical and vocational education programs offered by institutions of higher education. While it sounds simple, a lot of concepts just fell into place under it.

His point was simply, if a local manufacturer needs to hire a bunch of people to weld things, then maybe the local vocational school or community college or technical school ought to offer classes in welding, and as soon as the pupils were competent to weld, well, they're done. They get their diploma or certificate or whatever, and, they're ready for a job welding things.

It sounds so logical that we're wondering why the concept never caught on.

After all, every now and again we read in the newspapers about a 12-year-old who is going to college, or a high school graduate who can count back your change for you.

OK, now, this is the Kansas Statehouse, where most good ideas get caught in the fence, so let's figure out why Wempe's idea faces a whole lot of enemy fire.

Well, first, of course, is the money angle. You see, schools get state money based on time, not competency. If a technical school is going to get paid to offer courses in welding, then it has to outline a semester or two of courses that eventually will permit students to learn how to weld.

If a school can teach a pupil to weld over the weekend, then it isn't going to get the full amount of state payment for that undertaking. Schools get paid for semesters or years of work by instructors, whether the pupils need it or not.

It yields the "teach them as slowly as you can" philosophy. It's the difference between a mechanic working on your car by the hour, or promising to do the job for a flat rate, no matter how long it takes. This "competency-based exit" must work, because auto manufacturers use a similar system. They will pay dealers' mechanics a flat rate for performing a specified job on a car, no more, no less. And the manufacturer doesn't care whether the mechanic spends 10 minutes working on a car or all day sprawling underneath it. The pay is the same.

Are we getting the idea here? And are we noticing that we're getting the idea decades after one of the nation's largest users of technical and vocational workers has made it their industry-wide practice?

While the "competency-based exit" concept seems natural for technical and vocational education, it will take years for the idea to actually work out, because that's not the way things are done in Kansas--and, incidentally, probably why you still have to honk sometimes to get people in the right hand lane to actually go ahead and turn when the traffic is clear.

See, the concept behind vocational and technical school compensation in Kansas is payment for classes taught. If you're not teaching classes you're not getting paid.

Nobody seems to have an off-the-shelf plan for paying vocational and technical schools on a per-head of competent welders basis.

If that idea sounds logical for vocational and technical education, is there a reason that it couldn't be applied to almost all education? There probably are some reasons. It would leave teachers who can teach pupils quickly with time on their hands.

And, there will always be those pupils who no matter how long you spend with them just aren't going to learn to diagram sentences. Teachers with all fast-learners will be done with their classes by Valentine's Day, while day others won't be done by Memorial Day. There are some wrinkles to be worked out.

Oh, and no matter how advanced the instruction and competent the pupil, not many of us want our gall bladders taken out or repaired or whatever they do to them, by a kid who skateboards to the hospital every morning.

Vocational and technical education may be the place to start with this "competency-based exit" business. But starting seems like something that the Legislature ought to consider.

Nov. 15, 2001
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Nov. 12, 2001)

Thoughts of Thanksgiving...sort of

As we prepare for Thanksgiving week, and consider that Indians helped the pilgrims get through their first cold, bleak winter on the East Coast, Kansas legislators' thoughts naturally turn to the state's four Indian-owned casinos and their lavish and relatively low-cost buffets.

What?

Yes, it's Indian casino time again, and putting aside the buffet lines, legislators are thinking about how to get through the upcoming cold winter and solemnly considering that the state is running perilously low on money to spend next session.

Figures are impossible to compute, because the casinos don't share any of their revenues with the state, and therefore, nobody knows for sure which casino is making money and which ones are going to have trouble making their bond payments, but the general presumption is that Harrah's, which is closest to Topeka by four-lane highway, is doing spectacularly well and three smaller casinos further north aren't.

Oh, and then, remember, there is former House Speaker Robin Jennison, of Healy, who is in the employ of Phil Ruffin, who owns Wichita Greyhound Park, the dog track at Wichita. Ruffin has been losing money for the last couple years because he really needs a couple hundred slot machines to accompany the dogs to turn a nice profit there.

And let's not forget the Woodlands horse and dog track in Kansas City, Kan., that is limping along and needs a casino, too, and then there's the dog track at Frontenac, which as far as Railsters can remember, never made any money and has been open and closed and open and closed and can't even get the Baptist women's groups to hold meetings there to keep the plumbing working right.

So, as Thanksgiving thoughts swirl, there are hazy outlines of a money-making slots and pari-mutuel strategy wafting through the Statehouse.

What's the strategy? Well, its parts aren't coming together very quickly, or clearly, but the concept is that the three casinos that are north of Harrah's go together and put a single multi-tribe owned casino up near the Woodlands and the NASCAR track in the Kansas City area, under a deal that allows the state to take a piece of the casino's profits, Wichita's track gets slots and the Frontenac track gets its own slots, too.

That way, old people who gets on buses in Wichita don't have to bounce for three hours to get to a northeast Kansas casino, the Woodlands gets energized and a lifeline is thrown to Frontenac.

And, now watch this one, because it is a key to legislators who say they oppose further expansion of gambling in Kansas: the number of places where Kansans can wager their rent money is reduced from a total of six (two tracks--because Frontenac is closed--and four casinos) to four (three tracks, because Frontenac will reopen, and the Woodlands/three tribe casino, Wichita Greyhound Park and one free-standing Indian casino, Harrah's north of Topeka).

This will take some legislation, of course. But the key to slot machine legislation is producing money for the state, quickly. With a special deal for the Indian casinos that relocate to the Kansas City area, there's a state concession that is worth money from the tribal gaming. And the pari-mutuel tracks suddenly find new customers, and start paying more money to the state.

All the while, legislators can say they have reduced if not the occurrence, at least the locations, of gambling in Kansas, and can go home and tell their Nazarene constituents they've done a good thing and made the state some money, too.

Where's the governor in all this? Well, he's not adverse to the idea, but nobody has written it down yet and taken it to him. Railsters figure that someone eventually will, and now, you'll be in on the concept, and can decide if you like it or not.

Or, of course, you can decide that you just don't care, because at last check, all this gambling that we have now is strictly optional for the public. Nobody is being told to gamble as a condition of probation or to keep their library card in good standing.

Just some pre-Thanksgiving thoughts from the Statehouse, where even the simplest holiday traditions get mangled.

Nov. 8, 2001
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Nov. 5, 2001)

Bad money news

Government and legislative leaders got some bad news last week on the financial front, and it should be relatively interesting to see by their reaction to the drop in revenues how the 2002 legislative session is going to play out.

Here are the numbers: The state is expected to take in $113.4 million less in the current fiscal year than lawmakers thought when they adjourned the session in the spring. So, they basically either have to reduce spending yet this fiscal year (which started July 1 and will end June 30, 2002) or enter the next fiscal year with a lot less in the checking account than they hoped.

The millions of dollars sound big. But it amounts to 2.5 percent of the amount of money that the Legislature based its budget on. In hard dollars, it's the difference between the $4.449 billion that the current year's budget is based on and $4.335 billion that the state is likely to take in this year.

But, the bright spot? The state's Consensus Revenue Estimating group, made up of financial and tax experts and university economists, believe that the state will turn the corner and start to see some real growth about a year from now. That means you will be more prosperous around New Year's Eve of 2002 and will be paying more money to the state, all in all, probably not a bad thing.

So, if this was your household, and like most households, has bills coming in, and knows that next year's shoes for the kids are going to cost more and there's probably going to be some dental work necessary, what would you do?

Practically, it's shut off all excess spending. Now, that's something that can cause a fight at the dinner table. And it can cause tremendous problems for the Legislature, because every dollar spent by the state is important to someone. Some person or group lobbied legislators vigorously last year to get money in the budget, and now that revenues are going to be $113 million less than expected, who gives up their money?

Passersby in the Statehouse might just figure that the floor in the designated area for volunteers to give back some of their money is soft, and folks are naturally afraid to stand there.

Part of the problem, of course, is that the state will be more than halfway through the fiscal year when the Legislature gets back to town to deal with the shortfall. It's easier to cut spending gradually over a fiscal year than it is to jerk money out of the last six months of the fiscal year.

Oh, and remember when the Legislature returns to Topeka in January, it is likely to spend at least a month hollering about why it wasn't told earlier that the revenues would drop, and another month fighting over which programs get cut and by what amount, and then, once there appears to be general agreement that something has to be cut, there are the politics of the cuts to be considered.

And don't forget that 2002 is an election year for the Kansas House of Representatives and statewide offices. What House member wants to go home--if they still have a home in their district after reapportionment--and tell voters that they voted to cut money to programs that voters like?

So, do programs that are important to differing groups of people--like assistance to the poor and ill, more money for schools, stepped-up security to protect Kansas against terrorist attacks, health insurance for state workers, advertisements in national media to encourage out-of-staters to vacation and spend taxable money in Kansas--get cut?

And, although the estimators believe that after July 1, 2002, the state's revenues will increase by 3.4 percent--and legislators will have $152.6 million more to spend than in the current fiscal year--will voters revel in that spending for the five weeks before the August 2002 primary election and not toss out of office legislators who voted for spending cuts? Who knows?

Railsters, who watch the Statehouse in good times and bad, know that it's fun to be a legislator when there is plenty of money to spend, and it's not fun to be a legislator when budgets have to be cut, either prospectively or on the run, as will likely be the case in the upcoming session.

And, we're not sure that it is a bright spot, but some of the state's better minds are going to be at work on the revenue problem.

How do we know that? Well, the consensus estimators believe that there is going to be more smoking and more drinking--based statistically on higher expected taxes from cigarettes, beer, liquor and drinks at bars--than they thought last spring.

Nov. 1, 2001
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Oct. 29, 2001)

Dropping a three-inch heel

Who would have thought that the shortest potential candidate for the Republican gubernatorial nomination would turn out to be apparently the most recognized among Kansas Republican politicians?

Well, leaks from a private poll conducted by Attorney General Carla Stovall show that she is indeed the most recognized and most popular among a handful of Republican nomination wannabees--at least right now.

Whether she wants to drop a three-inch heel into the pile of wing tips which are walking toward Republican primary election voters probably won't be known until next week. But what a tidal wave of scrambling it would touch off, political observers agree.

Stovall isn't leaking any poll numbers herself, of course, because it's her poll, but some who have seen it say that in a race against House Speaker Kent Glasscock, R-Manhattan, Glasscock wouldn't get out of single digits.

And State Treasurer Tim Shallenburger would attract votes in the low teens, while Stovall would be well above 40 percent.

That's enough clout for the attorney general to literally call the shots on the GOP nomination for a chance to challenge Insurance Commissioner Kathleen Sebelius, a Democrat.

Sebelius, of course, has been working toward this race for more than two years, finally got the Democratic Party set up so that in all but six (of the state's 105) counties there is a party organization that can help her campaign. Those six counties? They're in the west, where Democrats are sparse anyway.

So, how are Republicans arrayed? Well, there's Glasscock, in the race first, and off to a relatively dull start. He even resorted a couple weeks ago to "showing a little leg" by announcing he has raised at least $200,000 for his campaign. He's probably nearing a quarter-million dollars now, but the campaign is, well, a draft horse, not a quarterhorse.

That wouldn't be bad, except that the liberal-to-moderate wing of the GOP in Kansas considers Glasscock as a failed moderate. He had to do a lot of dealing with hard-core Republican conservatives in the House of Representatives to keep his job and its good parking space last session, and moderates in the GOP are not big believers in redemption.

Treasurer Shallenburger? He's a fiscal and social conservative-as-you-want-me-to-be who horrifies moderates, but who is among the canniest of players in the GOP, and is a populist person-to-person campaigner almost as good as the late Gov. Joan Finney, who remains the benchmark for hand-shaking, name-remembering, personalizing of the political process.

Others in the pack? Well, of course, there's State Republican Chairman Mark Parkinson, of Olathe, who keeps popping up in conversation, but probably just likes to see his name in the papers.

Oh, and there's Senate President Dave Kerr, R-Hutchinson, who could surely assemble a big-bucks campaign, but who isn't as outgoing as most would expect a gubernatorial candidate to be. That could be fixed, of course, with a brief visit to a political charm school.

Lt. Gov. Gary Sherrer--who got out of the race months ago, before 1st District U.S. Rep. Jerry Moran of Hays decided to stick in Congress--still is looking. He's upset with Glasscock for abandoning tax increases for K-12 education, and some believe he could re-enter the race just to see if he could finish higher than Glasscock.

Wild card? Of course, it's former GOP Chairman David Miller of Eudora, who was defeated in the primary three years ago by Gov. Bill Graves, and hasn't yet tumbled to the concept that he can be most helpful to pro-lifers by working for an antiabortion attorney general candidate. An AG can do more in the morning to stop abortion in Kansas than a governor can all day long.

So, for a moderate critical mass, Stovall probably has to be somewhere in the equation, either with a governorship candidacy of her own, or as a lieutenant governor candidate for another moderate Republican. Worried about the old political aphorism that "nobody votes for the lieutenant governor"?

That doesn't matter this cycle, when Republican primary voters may be scanning the ballot for any name they recognize...and that would be Stovall either as governor or lieutenant governor.

Stovall, of course, doesn't ride into the race on a white horse. Some remember her tossing the tobacco lawsuit to her former law partners who earned nearly $30 million for their work. Others remember her name being linked with that of billionaire Bill Koch. But few don't remember her name...and that could be crucial.