Between 25 retirements of Kansas House members this year and the Nov. 2 general election, Kent Thompson has high hopes the composition of the chamber will change — for the better.
If these two facts rid the House of enough ultra-conservatives, “maybe we can have more common sense in the building,” Thompson told the Register Thursday, a day after the official end of this year’s session.
But, that isn’t likely to be the end of debate for legislators, and Thompson fears there is no magic bullet to put to rest recent events so that the fiscal year 2016 budget will be on balance June 30 — a requirement of state law.
First, a week ago, Supreme Court justices ruled distribution of block grant funding for school districts does not meet the constitutional requirement that schools are funded in an equitable manner. Many poorer districts are underfunded. The justices gave legislators until June 30 to resolve the issue or face having the court close districts at the stroke of midnight on June 30, last day of the 2015-16 school year.
Dale Dennis, the Department of Education’s finance guru, predicted between $38 and $42 million was needed to fulfill the court order.
Then, shortly after the gavel fell on sine die Wednesday, it was announced that May tax revenue fell $74 million short of fulfilling expectations, even after those expectations had been lowered. It was the 10th time in 12 months tax revenue came up short.
Of course, Thompson said matter-of-factly, the shortfall complicates what legislators will do over the next 26 days to deal with school finance.
“There’s nothing specific” on the table, Thompson allowed. Republican senators caucused for two hours Wednesday, but couldn’t reach accord. “I understand there were three schools of thought,” though none drew enough support for traction.
One option mentioned informally, he said, was to raise the statewide property tax levy a mill or two, “but was ignored.” Each mill would raise $30 million, thus a levy increase of a little over 1 mill would meet apparent school needs.
The statewide levy today is 20 mills. When the economy was robust, it was cut from a 35-mill starting point when the State Base Aid Per Pupil funding formula was installed in 1992-93.
The revenue shortfall would be of albatross proportions, without legislators having to consider an increase in school funding.
Immediately, Thompson anticipates leadership in each house will huddle with Gov. Sam Brownback to decide how to proceed. If their decision is a special session — which seems logical— it probably won’t start before the week of June 20, Thompson said.
Some legislators, upset with the court’s ruling, have suggested ignoring the order to put more money into school funding. They called the ruling politically motivated.
Meanwhile, Thompson noted, the same could be said of the governor and legislators’ cuts to school and other funding, as well as other financial shenanigans, which keep them from revisiting ill-advised income tax cuts imposed in 2012 and 2013.
“When I first arrived in the Legislature (after being appointed in September 2013), I was told we were on the verge of a constitutional crisis” and it seems to be materializing with the two recent financial strokes, Thompson said.
“There are two things we can do, either raise more money through taxes, or cut agency funding and borrow more,” from such places as the Kansas Department of Transportation, he said. “I hope and pray for the good of the state’s future that we have a lot of turnover in the general election. What we’re doing today is not working.”
