November 2008

Nov. 27, 2008
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Nov. 24, 2008)

More industries want in “highway bill”

Old-timers at the Statehouse are sniffing something in the wind when what for decades we called the “highway bill” becomes a “transportation bill.”

Just the change in name means that when lawmakers this winter start casting about for a new bill to replace the 10-year highway plan which expires next summer, it’s going to be less just roads and bridges and more, well, more transportation of all sorts.

And the change in title probably means that even though there doesn’t seem to be much money available now for much of a new transportation plan, it’s going to include higher-than-ever percentages of whatever “highway bill” money lawmakers can come up with; it’s going to cover more aid to airports, mass transit systems, highway-railway links, and, yes, the ever-popular bike paths.

Along with spreading whatever money is available across more industries, this year there is going to be a more rigorous examination of the question: Is this road really needed?

Look for new levels of scrutiny of whether a road is the best way to encourage economic development in Kansas.

There will, of course, still be major manufacturing plants that are being considered in Kansas and other states and whether the employees can get to and from work and whether materials can get into the plant easily and cheaply, and whether finished products can get out of the plant and into the market place are vital.
Yes, there will always be those “build it and they will come” projects that make economic sense for the state.

But, for example, there is an “already built, can we staff it” situation in Wyandotte County. The Legends shopping/entertainment/auto racing, maybe casino-gaming, area is already pretty well served with roads.

But, the problem is that getting large numbers of Johnson County residents to those jobs up north in Wyandotte County probably doesn’t call for new roads as much as it calls for reliable, dependable and vastly expanded public mass transit.
Out west, where mass transit is largely impossible because the numbers of people are low, there is still traditional highway construction needed, largely for transporting agricultural commodities and livestock into and out of  processing plants, or at least to connections with rail lines.

And in nearly every county there are aging bridges, and without repairs or replacements their load limits are going to be reduced without some spending of state dollars.

But the real problem is that there is no assurance that Kansas is going to have money to work on those projects. Federal assistance? Maybe as part of an economic stimulus package, but probably short-term at best.

Where does the state go?

So far, nobody’s talking adding to the 24-cents-a-gallon gasoline tax or the 26-cents-a-gallon diesel fuel tax or changing the nature of the tax.

There’s talk of more state-local cooperation on funding projects, and some consideration of testing to see whether there are tolling possibilities to raise some fraction of the cost of maintenance of existing roads.

Part of the problem with financing whatever the state comes up with for a new transportation plan is that motor fuels tax.

At $4 a gallon, the gas tax amounted to a 6 percent tax on the price of fuel. At $2 a gallon, the same cents-per-gallon tax equals a 12 percent tax. As fuel gets cheaper, the percentage of its price that is tax increases.

Anyone else see something strange here?

Motor fuels are the one product that, bought at the retail level, sees wide swings of tax rate. Is there a middle ground here somewhere?

We’re guessing in the “old days” when mechanical pumps computed the price of a fillup, there was some reason for a flat cents-per-gallon tax. And, we’re guessing that now, when the pumps ask what grade of fuel you want and would you like a car wash with that, that the computation of a straight percentage tax is doable.

After all, when those hikers and joggers and bicyclists buy their shoes and bikes at varying prices, they pay varying amounts of sales tax, and depending on what they eat for energy, they’re paying different amounts for the fuel for those strolls or jogs or bike rides.

Nov. 20, 2008
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Nov. 17, 2008)

End of a free ride

Cities and counties are likely to see a surprise from the Legislature in the upcoming session…the end of the free ride that the state’s “truth in taxation” law has provided them for a decade.

That free ride? It allows cities and counties to spend more money with only the minor inconvenience of publishing a legal notice in the local newspaper that the commission is spending more money.

That notice, in small type buried in the back of your local newspaper, generally is just an admission that the city or county is adopting a budget that spends more money than the last budget did.

And, because that money comes from, well, from you, it would seem to be something that you might want to protest.

Well, for the last decade, there really wasn’t any way to protest that local budget. You could read about it if you could find the legal notice and gripe, but there wasn’t a real hammer to use to try to beat it back.

In an era when property values—against which local units of government levy taxes—had been rising consistently, local units of government could increase spending without raising the tax mill levy. The same levy rate raises more money when there is more property value to tax. And, as long as valuations rose, local officials could crow that they did nice things for constituents without raising the mill levy.

If the valuation of your home increases, and most did in recent years, you write a bigger check and take whatever solace you can from the mill levy not rising. That’s why local officials brag about keeping the mill levy the same, or maybe even lowering it a dab, while still spending more dollars.

For a decade, that “truth in taxation” notice was the only real acknowledgement of that increased spending.  Once published, local units of government are free to spend more money whether they raise the property tax mill levy or not.

Well, a legislative interim committee last week decided, essentially, that tax money is still real money, and whether the mill levy is raised or not, people ought to have the chance to object to the increased spending.

A bill that would make that “truth in taxation” notice subject to a protest petition will be introduced in January. Upshot? If enough voters (number not yet determined) of the district sign petitions objecting to the budget, they can force an election on the budget.

What’s that mean? Either that the governmental unit adjusts the budget to spend no more money than the previous year, or the budget goes to a vote, at some cost of course, to see whether the governing body has the support of taxpayers for the budget.

Likely? The governmental unit will pare the budget to save the cost of the election—and potential political cost of losing the referendum.

That’s a big deal, a major sea change for local governments. It’s one thing to publish a notice in the paper; it’s another thing to defend it to an entire community, not just the handful of folks who typically hang around the city council or county commission during tedious and complicated budget discussions.

The protest petition? It’s not easy to get people to sign up, and it takes time and coordination, but it is possible. And then, the issue changes from “truth in taxation” to very simply, taxation and what level of local government spending and taxation people are willing to agree to.

If the bill passes, and its chances are probably pretty good next session…the free ride is over.

Nov. 13, 2008
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Nov. 10, 2008)

Big Oil, meet Big Milk

What if every umbrella carried a warning label that said, roughly, that although this is an umbrella that will keep you dry, a federal government agency has determined by its research that you will have left it in the car when it starts to rain.

It sorta, well, diminishes that foresight that you thought you exercised when you bought that umbrella, doesn’t it?
OK, Kansas government isn’t doing anything with umbrellas, but it is preparing to do about the same thing with…milk.

Yes, milk.

And, we’re figuring that we won’t be the first to label an obscure action in an obscure legislative committee a victory for what we’re imagining will become widely known as “Big Milk.” That’s Big Milk, as in Big Oil or Big Steel or Big-whatever dominates an industry.

Here’s what happened last week. The Rules and Regulations Committee—that obscure panel that vets rules and regulations proposed by state agencies—OK’d a proposed rule by the Kansas Department of Agriculture dealing with the labeling of the milk you buy at the grocery store.

That new rule and regulation says if a milk producer wants to tout on the label of the milk jug or carton that the milk is from cows that haven’t been given additional amounts of a naturally occurring hormone in cows—a hormone that dramatically increases their milk production—they have to also put on the label in the same size of type a notice that says, essentially, “big deal.”

The hormone, which the dairy industry calls rBST or sometimes BST, occurs naturally in cattle. But, feed the cattle some extra hormone and their milk production increases—which means more milk for dairy farmers to sell. That’s the Big Milk deal.

Now, if  you are a dairy farmer who wants to sell his/her milk to a milk niche market—the environmentalists, the purists who don’t want anything unnatural in their food or even anything natural but added “unnaturally” to their food—you’ll want to label it as additional hormone-free. That’s what makes your milk different, and probably worth a little more at the grocery store for some number of discerning milk buyers who actually read the label instead of just checking the “sell by” date.

Think: Should I sell lot of milk as “regular” or considerably less as “premium”?

But that required tag line, that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has determined that being hormone-free doesn’t make the milk any better or safer or really much different than any other milk dims its cachet, doesn’t it?
If you want to pay a little more for hormone-free milk, well, go ahead, but it really doesn’t matter to your health or your children’s health, says the USDA. Buy more expensive milk if you want, but it just means you’ll have to send your kids to a community college.

That additional labeling, in the same size type as the notice that the milk is additional hormone free, sorta takes the air out of that “hormone free” label, doesn’t it?

Oh, and that additional labeling probably means that the chemical companies that produce that hormone supplement will still have a strong market for that hormone, doesn’t it?

hat’s how you get to be Big Milk, not just some farmer who wears sandals and hums classical music to cows he/she knows by name as they are being milked. It’s about super-charging your cattle to produce all the milk they can, as long as labeling laws sap the marketing advantage of  hormone-free milk.

Interesting little scrap, isn’t it?

 

Nov. 6, 2008
(Distributed to Kansas newspapers Nov. 3, 2008)

Good time to check

This week senators and representatives are elected to the Kansas Legislature, and surprisingly, this is the time—after all the voting is over—for Kansans to check the finance reports of those just elected.

That just sounds wrong now that the yard signs are coming down and you don’t have to mow around them anymore, the robo calls have stopped and finally we can see commercials that actually show us what the new Fords are going to look like next year.

But it isn’t wrong, and checking those campaign finance reports now at your leisure ought to give you an idea what those new senators and representatives are most interested in for the upcoming session.

You just go to the Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission website, click on campaign finance reports, and you can see where virtually every dollar spent on campaigns came from and where it went.

Now, many of those contributions are from friends and neighbors, and who knows what their interest is. But if you look for political action committee money, well, you have a good idea what sort of legislation teacher union contributions are designed to encourage, or those from banks or car dealers or chambers of commerce or environmental groups or utilities or pro-life or pro-choice groups.

Those outfits quiz the candidates—often requiring extensive surveys—before they turn loose of a check to a candidate for the Senate or House.

Now, those elected with the help of specific interest groups aren’t just bought and sold and their votes locked up. No, and you’ll not find lobbyists reminding legislators who helped finance their election. It might sound like it, but things are more subtle than that in the Statehouse.

But, you’ve probably found from the contributor lists who is going to get time to make his/her case with the legislator when issues pop up that the donor has interest in. It’s not buying votes as much as buying at least the chance to try to influence the lawmaker.

Now, should anyone have to make contributions to a candidate to get access? No. And practically, if a real, live voter from a legislator’s district shows up at the Statehouse, the lobbyist will be bounced out of the office in favor of the voter. (Oh, reporters get bounced, too, in favor of the voter.) That’s the practical aspect of it.

Constituents get to make their case, too, but it probably means—for issues that don’t directly effect you or your district, and many legislative issues don’t—that someone else is talking to your lawmaker.

Is that a problem?

Probably not, but if there’s an issue that you care about and you have a different take on it than the industry involved, well, you might want to write a letter, or make a call or show up at a Saturday eggs’n’issues breakfast, or maybe show up at the Statehouse…