Ed Trimmer

Legislative report from Ed Trimmer — I have now heard 10 “State of the State” speeches from three different Governors.  I have liked some of what I have heard and I have also disagreed with some of the things that have been said, even from Governors from my own party.  I have never heard anything like what I heard in Governor Brownback’s speech a week ago Thursday.

The attempts to pass the buck, grab more and more power, and distort the truth were numerous and constant.  At times I felt like I was listening to the schoolyard bully and at other times I thought the Governor was speaking of an alternative universe.  Let me touch on a few of the issues that created these perceptions.

The Governor began by suggesting that things were just fine in Kansas.  He said we have created thousands of private sector jobs since he has taken office.  It is true we have created many new jobs but we have also lost almost as many.  The reality is that the new jobs do not pay as well as the ones that were lost.  We are not keeping pace with states around us.  The Wichita area is not doing well, and a large number of the new jobs were created before the 2012 income tax cuts, which created the current deficit.

The Governor praised education and how Kansas ranks nationally in regard to test scores.  Then he blamed the education funding formula and last year’s funding equalization bill, which he signed, for the current budget shortfall.  He said we count students who do not exist and have automatic spending increases built into the budget.  He knows these claims are just political rhetoric.

We use weightings to fund special needs.  For example, a district in western Kansas might have high transportation costs so we might count students who ride the bus as 1.2.  Vocational programs require expensive equipment, so we might count a student in a vocation program as 1.5.  It is a way to fund programs based on participation and is the fairest way to provide equal opportunity for all students and schools systems and the Governor knows this.

He proposed that we create a new funding formula but would not say what it might be.  His proposal was to give the schools the same amount of money they received in 2015, for 2016 and 2017 minus KPERS costs.  In the mean time, he would have the legislature develop a new formula.

Having served on two education study commissions, several things are clear to me; our formula is not broken, our formula is not more complex than any other state, and it is one of the fairest formulas in the country.  The court did not rule that the funding formula was unconstitutional as the Governor asserted.

The court just said we are not adequately funding it.  I am concerned that the Governor wants to blame the economic crisis he created on the current funding formula for education with no clear vision of how he would change it.

The only reason education costs have gone up in the past few years is because of court ordered increases and a larger number of students.  However, even these increases have not kept pace with inflation.  The only increase in costs built into the formula is for new students, because we fund schools by student population (Base State Aid Per Pupil).  Is the Governor suggesting that growing school districts receive no more funding and declining school districts keep getting the same funds?  If we were to fund schools at the 1992 level with inflation, our per-pupil expenditure should be over $6000 per student instead of the $3852 it is today.

The deficit is not due to education as the Governor claims.  Many well-known economists and even the non-partisan Legislative Research Department told the Legislature and the Governor that the tax cuts of 2012 were not sustainable and that we would be at least $500 million in debt by 2016.  We have arrived at that point early.  We must make up more that $280 million for the rest of this year and more than $700 million for 2016 and again in 2017.  Education did not create the budget deficit, the Governor did.

Governor Brownback said in his speech that the Kansas Public Employees Retirement System (KPERS) unfunded liability was the most important issue facing the state and that he was proud of the 2012 legislation he helped create to solve the unfunded liability by 2033.  As one of the legislative leaders who helped create the 2012 plan, I am amazed at the Governor’s claim that he helped create it.  His office, in reality, has consistently promoted a 401K-style plan, which is impossible until the current system is fully funded without creating a larger unfunded liability.

On Friday, January 16th, the Governor proposed not fully funding the 2012 KPERS plan, which would postpone paying off the unfunded liability until at least 2043 and would, according to KPERS actuaries, add more than $9 billion to the unfunded liability.  He has also proposed that school districts pay the KPERS costs rather than the state, which would result in a cut to public education. Something he promised not to during his re-election campaign.

The Governor has also used the budget crisis he created and the court’s stance on education funding to argue that he should be given the right to pick Supreme Court Justices.  He seems to believe in the old political adage,  “Never let a good crisis go to waste?”  The current system was put in place in 1953 after a Governor abused the selection process.  Governor Brownback wants to return to the pre-1953 process and eliminate the checks and balances we currently have.

The Governor also proposed that local elections be moved to the fall to improve voter turnout.  These elections are in the spring because they do not involve party politics.  They should stay that way.  Local units of government are not asking for the change nor are most local voters.

I have mentioned only what I believe are the biggest whoppers and abuses in the “State of the State” address.  There are more, but to conserve space, I will let others comment on them.  I know this update is a bit more pointed than what I usually write, but this year’s “State of the State” speech was without question the most distorted view of what is happening in Kansas I have ever heard.  It is time for the Governor to admit that his 2012 tax plan is bankrupting the State.

He must accept responsibility and not continue to scapegoat our teachers, school children, retirees, and other branches of government.  It is time to take constructive action to put Kansas back on the right track, but it looks like that will have to be left up to the Legislature, not the Governor.

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