October 2009
Oct. 29, 2009
(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers Oct. 26, 2009)Get out your calendars
Folks who follow Kansas government and politics are adding two circles to their calendars—Oct. 30 and Nov. 5—to get ready for the juiciest, most politically charged numbers that we’re going to get this year.
The first new circle (we presume you are smart enough to have already circled your anniversary) is Friday’s release of October tax-only revenues to the state. That’s the monthly peek at the current fiscal year’s health, which is already $96.5 million below estimates on which the current state budget is cast.
The second new circle: The release of Consensus Revenue Estimates for the remainder of this fiscal year—that’s through June 30, 2010—and the official estimate of state revenues for the following state fiscal year (that’s FY ’11 in Statehouse argot) on which the governor is required to base his upcoming budget. The current-year estimate represents the size of cuts the governor will have to propose to lawmakers in January just get to FY ’11.
Nobody in the Statehouse is expecting either circled date to yield good news.
The October numbers will set off nearly a week of speculation by government-watchers about the Consensus Revenue Estimate. Already, lawmakers are considering that they’ll be nearly $500 million short of revenues for the new fiscal year just to meet current spending levels and obligations—like bond payments, salaries, pension contributions and such. That whining about budget cuts by the last Legislature was just a tune-up for the coming session.
Some canny legislators are already feeling a dab foolish for allowing Gov. Mark Parkinson to borrow $700 million from state idle funds in July, which means that there is no chance that he’ll have to do spending cuts before the Legislature convenes in January. That means lawmakers are going to have to vote on cuts—rather than just keeping a straight face while blaming Parkinson for unilaterally making off-session cuts, with their attendant political heat.
But there’s a political trade-off here in that likely hundreds of millions of dollars of budget cuts are going to be neatly printed in January in the governor’s budget document for all to see and grumble about. They will clearly be the governor’s budget cuts—and possibly tax increases: His path out of the forest.
House members seeking reelection next year can wave the budget book and say, “the governor made us do it” and hope that brings them absolution in the voting booth. Senators? They’re in the middle of their terms and won’t run for reelection again until, hopefully, the economy is a little better.
Those two circles will essentially tell Kansans and Kansas politicos whether that third circle on the calendar will mean an anniversary dinner of steak…or chicken.
Oct. 22, 2009
(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers Oct. 19, 2009)The loaded pistol…
If there was ever a loaded pistol on the nightstand for Kansas Republicans, it probably is the “Taxed Enough Already” (TEA) wing of the party that sprang up in parking lots, outside government buildings and in the conservative media this summer and fall.
Luckily for moderate Republicans, we’re headed toward chilly weekends, when it’s uncomfortable for anti-government, enough-government or whatever folks to congregate.
And sometime this fall, national health-care reform—or at least change—will probably be decided or not decided in Congress, and there may or may not be reason for the TEA baggers to return to the streets with their signs and complaints about government intervention in health care.
That’s why this winter is going to be worth watching, to see whether continued complaints about health issues, or maybe a new issue that we haven’t seen yet, pops up to bring the TEA baggers back to the parking lots when the weather turns nice next spring.
The TEA baggers, of course, are predominantly Republican or would be if they decide to get politically active next year. That’s when the “regular” Republicans, the still generally conservative but “let’s make this government thing work” crew, must watch who files for House seats in the Kansas Legislature.
If some of those TEA baggers decide to run for the Kansas House, well, there will be primary elections, and in a few districts, the incumbent Republicans who at least know how government works will lose primaries to them, ultimately possibly handing their seats to Democrats who will woo moderate Republicans’ votes. Or not.
That’s why this winter becomes important for so-called moderate Republicans and—for different reasons—Democrats in Kansas, where in past years a relative handful of Republican primary voters winds up deciding the general election by electing a candidate who can or can’t hold together the GOP faithful through the general election.
Moderate Republicans, at least through the primary election, can’t afford to rile the TEA baggers, but probably shouldn’t offer them much comfort. Democrats? They probably ought to hope for a good spring for the TEA baggers, maybe offering valet parking or at least coffee at the conservative rallies, hoping that from among the crowds will come Kansas House candidates who can win primaries but be un-electable at the general election.
Interesting winter coming up, interesting spring. Oh, and 125 Kansas House seats are up for grabs…
Oct. 15, 2009
(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers Oct. 12, 2009)Baby boomers get a little wistful…
Now, here’s an interesting little idea that is looking for a sponsor in the upcoming legislative session—removing marijuana from the state’s list of controlled substances.
A few young Democrats at Demofest—the Kansas Democratic Party’s mid-year convention in Wichita recently—were trolling to find some legislator to introduce the bill for debate next session. It would simply take marijuana off the state’s controlled substance list, making it one of those little—but legal—character flaws like drinking and smoking but which doesn’t constitute a criminal act.
Oh, did we mention that next year is an election year, so we’re presuming that if the youngsters find some legislator willing to introduce the bill—unless he/she is from, maybe, Lawrence—it would be pretty much a parting shot?
But the concept is fairly intriguing and while nearly politically impossible, probably shows that at least part of the state’s population is thinking about what has become the reduction in outrage/fear/angst for at least one herb. And, it might also hint that as Kansans get older, the baby boomers who smoked a little grass in their youth and grew up to marry and buy cars and homes and have kids and wait for grandchildren recall marijuana as a pretty benign substance.
Talk marijuana, and you get some wistful looks in the eyes of Kansans who are nearing retirement age. Mention methamphetamines and that wistfulness changes to visions of violence, of illegal in-home meth labs w
th babies crawling around in the debris, smuggling, addiction and stuff that Kansans just flatly don’t want to see.
But, homegrown marijuana? You gotta wonder whether some grown-ups have a plant or two growing for personal consumption in those little planting gadgets you get from home gardening catalogs.
Oh, there will be problems, of course, including a bunch of county attorneys and law enforcement officers who have turned the war on drugs into a jobs program who will want to debate, at least for driving purposes, what constitutes being “one toke over the line.”
But it might be an interesting debate to have.
Much of a chance? Probably not, but just that there are people actually working the issue says something about the changing character of the state and of the decidedly less frenetic opposition to marijuana among a, gently, we hope, aging of the population.
Oct. 8, 2009
(Syndicate to Kansas newspapers Oct. 5, 2009)Where’s the public?
Count on it, there will be a bill next session, like last session in the Kansas Legislature that will seek to prohibit smoking in—and this is the precise part—places to which the public has access.
That’s offices, restaurants, stores, government buildings, nearly everywhere that you can just wander into. Your home, your car, probably private clubs, and at the lake or park, generally outdoors where there’s a lot of air, you can smoke if you care to or have to, just not indoor places where other people must involuntarily breathe in the smoke.
The loudest complaints about anti-smoking laws tend to come from bars and restaurants, where owners say generally that it’s their business and if their customers want to smoke, they should be able to. It’s one of those “free market” issues; people should be able to decide for themselves where they want to eat and drink.
But, strangely, the public isn’t deciding, which sends the issue to the Legislature where handsful of lobbyists and insiders will guide the discussion. There are public health issues involved, of course, and eventually—maybe not in an election year—a state law prohibiting smoking in public places will pass.
And, eventually, the opponents of smoking bans will join the opponents of mandatory seat belt laws and probably of meat inspection laws as people who just didn’t understand the inevitability. Makes you wonder whether they should be making our food.
But, you have to think that if a majority of people who care about the issue won’t do business in smoking establishments, well, those bars and restaurants would eventually go out of business or their owners would make less profit. It’s called voting with your feet. But that hasn’t happened noticeably in Kansas.
Sounds pretty simple, doesn’t it? It comes down—or could have come down—to bar and restaurant owners penciling it out and making their business plans. Do they cater to smokers or non-smokers, or that squishy bunch of Kansans who apparently don’t care, or haven’t cared up to now?
This may be something that big signs on the doors of restaurants and bars (or upgraded air handling systems) could have solved years ago.
But, it looks like the Legislature is going to have to solve something that Kansans won’t solve for themselves.
Oct. 1, 2009
(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers Sept. 28, 2009)Shouting “fire”
Must have been an interesting week, last week, when a KU School of Business white paper declared the Kansas Public Employees Retirement system to be “bankrupt under current operating assumptions.”
Imagine that if you are a state employee, a teacher, a retired or soon-to-be retired worker, you decided to just go ahead and drink that milk that is a day past its expiration date? Or, shake out into the bowl the dust at the bottom of the dog food bag?
Count it as a slow news week, but reporting that the pension system for tens of thousands of state workers is bankrupt is a little like shouting “fire” in a nursing home.
Oh, KPERS of course has financial problems. Its earnings were hammered last year by the recession-sapped stock market, and at some point, the state is going to have to increase its payments into the pension fund. It’s not going to be fun, of course, because there’s no immediate public relations payoff for diverting state dollars into a pension system.
Members of the system are contractually due their pensions. This summer, the state initiated a new pension system for newly hired workers. For those joining the state payroll after July1, the new system should take care of itself just fine.
But those already working for the state, in mid-career or even retired, well, they are due their pensions and that’s the problem. Oh, not for years, of course, but the current KPERS system requires attention.
The house isn’t on fire…
The key to pension systems is that they are long-term operations. If KPERS were to decide to go out of business, say, Friday, it wouldn’t have enough money to pay all what they are owed. But it’s not going out of business…probably as long as there is a State of Kansas.
Bankrupt? Catchy, attention-grabbing, but probably a little strong for the problems of KPERS. Will it get the attention of lawmakers who are in the next few years going to have to beef up contributions to the system? Undoubtedly. But it sure spooked some folks who probably don’t need to be spooked…