I am sure many of you thought the Legislature was never going to get moving. The reality is that the budget committee have been working doubly hard on trying to salvage what we can from the 2009 budget. This is the current fiscal year we are in now.
I serve on the Agriculture and Natural Resources Budget Committee that has the responsibility to review and recommend adjustments of 17 different agencies. This is a daunting task when you consider we have severe budget shortfalls. My approach is to ask the agency heads where they think cuts can be made and by working with them try to arrive at the minimum cuts with adequate expenditures to maintain services..
We have to remember some agencies receive State General Fund money and some receive only fee funds and some receive both. The Animal Health Department, Board of Accountancy, Department of Credit Unions for example are totally dependent on fees collected from those they serve.
A common practice started in 2002 allows the Governor to “sweep” any left-over fee-fund dollars and place it in the State General Fund. Several others and myself think this is not fair and not the right thing to do. If those you serve pay for services such as reviews, inspections and audits that is where that money should be spent.
When an agency has money left in their fund reserves they use it to start up operations the following year. If the money is swept away, what capital are they suppose to work with? When funds are removed the only option the agencies have is to increase fees. Isn’t that a hidden tax?
One of my new committee assignments finds me serving on the Judiciary Committee. This committee is made up of mostly attorneys and I am one of the 5 token “non-attorneys”. The topics are quite interesting as you might expect.
This week we heard HB 2109 “end of life issues”, HB 2250 “Prosecution of Sexual Predators and admissablilty of prior crimes or prior bad acts”, HB 2144 “The Community Defense Act”. This one deals with the negative secondary affects of Sexually Oriented Businesses (SOB’s).
The trick on this committee is to provide for;”Balance between individual rights, personal responsibility and providing that individual freedoms are guaranteed, and that the duties of the government to protect its citizens is maintained”.
In Commerce and Labor we once again take up contractor issues that deal with payment for services, continuing education, contract law, and a myriad of construction related items. I expect to see some workman’s compensation and minimum wage legislation proposed.
On Wednesday the 11th, I was once again provided the opportunity to host the Butler Grizzly National Championship Football Team. I introduced the team and coaches on the floor of the House and presented them with a State Certificate recognizing their accomplishments. As a special treat Father Brian Bebak from St. John Church in El Dorado provide the opening prayer.
The session to date has included a lot of committee meetings on a variety of issues. The most visible topic deals with the budget and where cuts must be made. As I told you before the FY 2009 budget needs close to $300 million cut and we have only a few days to finish it.
The next heavy lifting will take place for the FY 2010 budget. We are working on this as well, the biggest problem is where do we now come up with close to 1 Billion dollars to cut. Since we work on estimates we could still be off. If we cut too much we can adjust to the increased revenues pretty easily.
If we do not adjust enough we could have to come back next year for more “adjustments”. This is not a very pleasant time to be in Topeka. I will give our local school, city and county officials much credit for being pro-active. I think they have been working on this problem for some time and are frequently in contact with me requesting information or offering suggestions. Thanks to all of them for being part of the solution.
I did receive some good news from the Department of Commerce earlier this week. The Community Development Block Grant that was to help with a railroad spur in the El Dorado Industrial Park and at the BG Products Plant has been awarded. This $750,000 in Federal money had been promised since last year and for some reason was being held up somewhere.
I worked with El Dorado Inc., Linda Jolly, Herb Llewellyn, Mayor Mckibban and the Kansas Department of Commerce to work around the bottleneck and on Feb 11th I obtained a copy of the award letter with the Governor’s signature. Progress and construction can proceed and this major project that could bring close to $45 million dollars worth of improvements and developments to our Industrial Park. Thanks to all that helped.
As you can see there is a lot going on and I consider it an honor and privilege to be your Representative in Topeka and I do want to know what you think. You may reach me in Topeka at 1-785-296-7655, or State Capitol Topeka, Kansas 66612 or john.grange@house.ks.gov.
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