Adventures in the Statehouse, Vol 2013 Issue 10

Melanie Meier's Adventures in the Statehouse
Kansas House of Representatives
Volume 2013, Issue 10: March 18-22, 2013

In This Issue

- Preparing to Wrap it UP
- The House Budget
- The New House Tax Plan
- Handicapped Placards and Plates
- Keep in Touch

Preparing to Wrap it Up

This was the last week for Committee work in the 2013 Legislative
Session, so there were some last minute hearings and many bills were
worked and passed out to the House as a whole for debate. We also spent
some long days on the floor in debate of the House version of the budget
and a new tax plan that would alter the plan passed last year. I only
counted 30 bills being passed out to the Senate though, despite all the
long hours. Next week will be short in days, but the House and Senate
will spend all day debating bills and the House is scheduled for 26
bills on just Monday!

The House Budget

The House and Senate both passed out their own versions of the Budget
this week and the conference committee is already scheduled to meet on
Monday to start the process of working out their differences. We only
debated the budget for about 3.5 hours this year and only 11 amendments
were offered. That is a record low since I have been in the House.
This year's House budget has some interesting new methods in it to
reduce spending, as the Appropriations Committee tried to be creative.

Besides just basic cuts to every agency, the Appropriations Committee
proposed placing a "salary cap" on every agency. The Committee
Chair had legislative research compile a list of what every agency has
spent on salaries so far for the current fiscal year through March 15
(the FY does not end until June 30th) and told every agency that is the
amount they will get for FY2014. This results in huge cuts for some
agencies, and an actual increase for a handful of agencies that had
overspent their budgeted salaries to this point.

An example of those who lose (and this hits home in our community) is
the Department of Corrections. This salary cap does not take into
consideration the fact that two new units were opened or expanded in
FY2013 partly through the year – now those units' salaries in FY2014
will be based on only the few months of salary they received in FY2013.
I asked the Secretary of Corrections how this would affect his
Corrections Officers and operations. His Chief Finance Officer crunched
the numbers and reported that using conservative numbers, they would
have to lay off at least 94 people. We have spent all session studying
the current situation in the Department of Corrections and everyone
agrees that they need more people, not less.

An example of an agency that overspent their salary and now will get
more in FY2014 than they were budgeted to get in FY2013, is the
Lieutenant Governor's Office. There are only a handful of agency
budgets in this situation, and they are all very small. There is only
one exemption to the cap that was made through an amendment offered
during floor debate. The amendment removed the cap from the Board of
Regents and allows them to use reserve funds to pay for salaries. No
one else was exempted. The Senate did not use this method of cutting in
their budget, so we will now wait and see how this comes out of the
conference committee.

Another interesting amendment was offered to take the FY2015 budget out
of the bill. This year, the Governor announced in his State of the
State Address that he wanted to go to a 2 year budget in order to bring
some prior planning and stability to the budget process. The issue
though, is that it was too late to start a 2 year budget process this
year. None of the agencies had FY2015 figures so the budget
sub-committees and full Appropriations Committee had no input from
anyone on their FY2015 budgets. The result is that the amounts for
FY2014 were just carried over to FY2015. There was no input on
expansion of projects, or projects ending, or bonds being paid off, or
new bonding, or inflation, or growth of the economy, etc. Despite these
shortfalls, the amendment failed and the bill retains a budget for
FY2015 – which can be changed during next year's session.

The New House Tax Plan

The House Taxation Committee produced a new tax plan to try and alter
the income tax plan of last year. In an attempt to control the large
deficits that last year's plan will produce, the committee members
proposed: raising the State sales tax, sending the sales tax that is
supposed to go to the highway fund to the state general fund instead,
cutting income tax deductions, and creating a system to slowly reduce
income taxes based on economic growth.

After considerable debate on the floor and 6 offered amendments, the
bill passed by allowing the State sales tax to stay at 5.7 % after July
1st this year and allowing KDOT to keep their sales tax revenue stream,
which eliminates two of the proposed changes to last year's income tax
plan. A change that stayed in the bill is that if you itemize on your
State tax return, your income tax deductions will be cut by 24% this
year and again each year until they are gone, whether there is economic
growth or not. The income tax rates will be reduced only if the state
exceeds 2% growth (this is not specifically defined). These changes to
last year's tax plan produce over $390 million in revenue over the
next five years. That is not enough to end the deficits, but it does
eliminate $390 million worth of deductions that previously stayed in tax
payers' pockets (those who itemize).

The Senate's tax plan proposes a $497 million revenue increase over
the next 5 years and the Governor's initial plan was over $685 million
in revenue. Now the House and Senate conference committee will meet to
work out their differences. Some big differences in the Senate plan are
that the Senate sets the State sales tax rate at 6.3% indefinitely, the
income tax rates will go down each year whether or not the economy
improves, and the adoption tax credits are restored .

Handicapped Placards and Plates

We had an interesting hearing in Corrections & Juvenile Justice
Committee this week dealing with disability placards (hang tags) and
plates. Current law states that once a person who was issued a placard
or license plate dies, the placard must be returned to the DMV and the
plate must be returned to the County Treasurer. If another family
member is also eligible for the placard or plate, they can bring in
verification from their doctor and have the placard/plate transferred to
their name. This bill, HB2393, would make the failure to return them a
felony.

The Director of Motor Vehicles testified in opposition to the bill
saying that most of the placards and plates are returned, but most that
are not returned are because spouses who are also disabled believe they
can continue to use them as the vehicle was in both names. The bill did
not address fraudulent use of the placards/plates, just the failure to
return them. Therefore the DMV believes this proposed change would make
a person who merely misunderstands the law, a felon.

There was no proponent, so the Committee chose not to work the bill.
The reason I mention this bill is that many folks probably do not
realize that failure to return the placards when they expire is a
misdemeanor with a $50 fine! The placards also have a tendency to break
apart after long exposure to the sun, so do not just throw the pieces
away. Be sure to take the pieces back to the DMV.

Keep in Touch

You can track my activities on my website www.meier4kansas.com, my
FaceBook page www.facebook.com/Meier4Kansas, and Twitter
www.twitter.com/melaniemeier. I am privileged and honored to be your
voice in the Kansas Capitol.

If I can ever be of assistance to you, please feel free to contact me at
home or in Topeka. My office is on the 4th floor of the Capitol, Room
451-S. To write to me, my office address is Kansas State Capitol,
Topeka, KS 66612. You can also reach me at the legislative hotline,
1-800-432-3924. Additionally, you can e-mail me at
melanie.meier@house.ks.gov. And do not forget to follow the legislative
session online at www.kslegislature.org.

Adventures in the Statehouse, Vol 2013 Issue 9

Melanie Meier's Adventures in the Statehouse
Kansas House of Representatives
Volume 2013, Issue 9: March 11-15, 2013

In This Issue

- Last Week for Committee Work
- KBI and Washburn Forensic Lab
- Death Penalty Appeals
- Keep in Touch

Last Week for Committee Work

This coming week is the last week for bills to be considered in
non-exempt committees. The House will then spend several long days on
the floor debating legislation. As bills are passed, conference
committees will meet so that House and Senate versions of bills can be
reconciled and given final approval by both chambers. Then legislation
is off to the Governor for his signature or veto. Any bill that has not
passed both House and Senate chambers by "Drop Dead Day" on April 5th,
can no longer be debated (although certain bills, such as the budget,
are exempt from this deadline).

In April the Legislature will take a five-week break. This gives the
Governor ample time to take action on all legislation that has been sent
to his desk. In mid-April, updated revenue predictions will be released
for the state budget. On May 8th, the Legislature will reconvene for the
Veto Session. At that time we will finalize the budget based on the new
revenue projections, and take action on remaining conference committee
reports. Occasionally there are veto override attempts. The length of
the Veto Session varies from year to year, but the average length is
usually about 3-4 days. Finally, we will reconvene one more time at the
end of May for the ceremonial end of the session, which is referred to
as Sine Die.

KBI and Washburn Forensic Lab

This week, the Chair of the Transportation & Public Safety Committee
invited Washburn University and the Kansas Bureau of Investigation (KBI)
to come back to the committee to give us more detail on their
collaborative project to build a new forensics laboratory for the State
of Kansas. Earlier in the session the Committee had recommended to the
full Appropriations Committee to make the KBI pay the required $3.5
million initial engineering fees for the project out of their existing
fee fund balances. The Appropriations Committee had many questions
about the financing of the project and accepted the sub-committee's
recommendation. Since then, the KBI director provided more information
on the actual fee fund balances and how they are already factored into
the budget for 2014. Much of the money has already been transferred to
the Department of Administration, who will be handling the lease and
making the payments to Washburn University on behalf of the State and
KBI. The KBI also took money from the fee funds to fill employee
positions that they had to hold open last year due to the shrinkage
rates assigned by the legislature.

Yet, when the Transportation & Public Safety Budget committee went back
to the full House Appropriations with the additional information on the
costs of the project and the lack of fee funds, Appropriations voted
again to deny the $3.5 million. Hopefully, the Senate Ways & Means
Committee will weigh in on this decision. No one denies that the State
needs a new forensics laboratory. I just think back to the Hearings on
the bill to remove the statute of limitations on rape and the testimony
of the young lady who was the 13th victim of a serial rapist in
Lawrence. Her forensic lab results were just completed (over 4 years
after the crime), which leaves one year to find the rapist under
Kansas' current 5 year statute of limitation. She is still waiting to
see if there is a match in the national register from the comparison to
her forensic results.

The KBI director testified that the turnover rate for forensic
scientists is 33%. He stated that part of the problem is the salary and
part of it is the working conditions. Currently, a trained scientist
can be hired away from the State to work in state of the art
laboratories. Kansas' current lab is in the KBI building, which is an
old converted high school in Topeka. The State of Kansas pays
approximately $197,000 to train a scientist. With a new lab on the
Washburn University campus, the working conditions would be state of the
art and students would be able to work at the lab, cutting the cost of
training and enhancing their educational experience. A win-win for
both the KBI and the students

Death Penalty Appeals

Corrections & Juvenile Justice Committee had several bills this week
dealing with appeals by persons sentenced to death.

SB40 would amend the statutes on the use of DNA results to grant a new
trial. The Kansas District & County Attorney Association requested the
statute to be changed so that rather than saying when DNA is found
"unfavorable to" or "favorable to" a case, it should read "do
not exonerate" or "exonerate." They testified that if new DNA is
found that could show a 3rd person's involvement in a crime, that it
should not be "favorable" to the request for a new trial, the DNA
could just be showing that a scientist made a mistake rather than
exonerate the person on death row. The Kansas Association of Criminal
Defense Lawyers and the Project for Innocence, both opposed the
requested change. They testified that the change would create barriers
to request a new trial in a death penalty case that are harder to
overcome than in a non-death penalty case, and that it would be a higher
standard of proof than was needed to put the person in jail in the first
place.

HB2388 dealt with the Supreme Court review of errors in capital murder
cases and HB2389 dealt with prosecutors' notice of intent to seek the
death penalty. Both of these bills were requested by the Solicitor
General Office of the Kansas Attorney General. The Deputy Solicitor
General testified that HB2388 was requested because of a court case
where the Court did not use the established rules of appellate procedure
and this bill would ensure the rules were followed. The Innocence
Project public defenders testified in opposition, saying the proposed
change would limit how a person could appeal the death penalty and would
actually make the appeal process take longer than it already does. The
public defenders explained that death penalty cases require "super due
process diligence" so if an error is found, it should be corrected as
soon as possible. The change proposed by this bill would just stop the
correction of errors in the earlier stages of the appeals process and at
the lowest level possible. The errors would be considered eventually
but would prolong the procedure by years and the appeals process for the
death penalty is much too long and costly now.

HB2389 would change the requirement for the County or District
Attorney's office to file the notice that the death penalty will be
requested to the "prosecuting" attorney. The Deputy Solicitor
General explained that in small towns or counties that there may be a
conflict of interest for the county/district attorney in a case because
of prior dealings with the defendant. In these cases, a special
prosecuting attorney will be brought in and that they should be able to
file the notice. There were no opponents to this proposed change.

Adventures in the Statehouse, Vol 2013 Issue 8

Melanie Meier's Adventures in the Statehouse
Kansas House of Representatives
Volume 2013, Issue 8: March 6 - 8, 2013

In This Issue

- Short but Busy Week
- Combatting Human Trafficking in Kansas
- The Modernization Fee on Your Vehicle Registration
- The Merger of KDOT and KTA
- Innovative School Districts
- Keep in Touch

Short but Busy Week

The legislature hit the ground running upon its return from Turnaround.
I testified in several Senate Committees on House Veteran Bills and the
House Veteran Committee had a hearing on a Senate Bill already. Then
next week there are at least two more House Veteran Bills being heard in
the Senate and another Senate bill in the House Veteran Committee. At
this rate, we should start seeing some of these bills hitting the
Governor's desk soon for signature!

Combatting Human Trafficking in Kansas

In Corrections & Juvenile Justice Committee this week we heard
informative and emotional testimony on SB61 which creates and amends
statutes dealing with Human Trafficking. The bill is 98 pages long and
creates 7 new sections of statute as well as amending current law. The
new sections allow the Attorney General to train law enforcement,
creates a Human Trafficking Advisory Board and establishes a fund for
paying for that training and the support, care, treatment, and other
services for victims of human trafficking and commercial sexual
exploitation of a child. The bill creates secure facilities for victims
to stay in and a website for information on how to get help. The bill
eliminates the word "prostitution" and replaces it with "the sale
of sexual relations" throughout Kansas statutes and patronizing a
prostitute would be called "buying sexual relations."

Victims of Human Trafficking Organizations that support victims such as
the Wichita State University Center for Combatting Human Trafficking and
Veronica's Voice, and various law enforcement organizations and
prosecutors all testified with the Attorney General on the need for the
bill. When asked if this was really a big problem in Kansas and if
other states around Kansas had such legislation and programs, a
prosecutor from Sedgwick County stated he could think of at least 24
cases that he personally had worked and that they often entail the
transport of young girls throughout the state and to and from other
states. The Attorney General stated that Missouri currently has tougher
statutes on Human Trafficking than Kansas, but Kansas has law
enforcement and support organizations that are actually on the ground
fighting this issue now and they are the ones who are asking for SB61 to
give them the tools they need to stop Human Trafficking.

The Modernization Fee on Your Vehicle Registration

Did you ever notice the "Modernization Fee" when you registered your
vehicles during the past four years? This is a fee that the 2008
legislature decided to create in order to pay for the new vehicle
registration computer system that we heard so much about last summer. I
had been receiving inquiries from folks in the district recently, asking
why the fee is still being charged now that the new system is in place.
So I was happy when we had a hearing in Transportation & Public Safety
Budget Committee this week on HB2137, which proposed deleting this $4
fee.

It turns out though, that the 2010 T-Works Transportation Plan had a
section in it making the fee permanent and sending the money to the
State Highway Fund. This amounts to approximately $12 million a year.
The proponent of the bill stated that the legislature had promised that
the fee would be temporary and end when the computer system
modernization program was complete. The opponents stated that the
legislature promised the $12 million a year to the T-Works Program to be
part of the funding stream for 10 years of contracting for Kansas
creating 175,000 jobs and $81 million in projects to each county. I
asked why the fee was still called the "Modernization Fee" if that
is not what it was. The next day a Representative offered an amendment
in committee to change the name of the fee to the "T-Works" fee and
to have it expire in January 2021, when the current T-Works program
would end. This way he said that the legislature would be keeping both
promises. The Committee adopted the amendment and recommended the bill
favorably to the House as a Whole.

The Merger of KDOT and KTA

This week the House debated HB2234, which would merge the Kansas
Turnpike Authority (KTA) into the Kansas Department of Transportation.
The debate went on for 2 hours on the House floor and the final vote is
Monday morning. This bill is something that the Governor proposed in
his State of the State Address last January and he counted $30 million
of savings in the budget over the next 2 years as the expected result of
the merger. However, after 3 days of hearings in the Transportation
Committee and further testimony in the Transportation & Public Safety
Committee, the Secretary of Transportation could not explain how the
savings would be achieved. The two agencies already work closely
together in accordance with a law that was passed in 1975, that requires
close cooperation while keeping the organizations separate. The
Transportation Committee amended the bill to remove many of the
requirements it proposed and the carrier of the bill now says that
pretty much nothing will change.

The KTA will remain a quasi-governmental organization that operates on
its own with its own funding and debt, and continue to cooperate with
KDOT. The Secretary of Transportation will remain a member of its
board, but will not be the Chair. The tolls can only be used for the
turnpike and any connecting road within a 10 mile limit of the turnpike.
A clause allowing KDOT use of KTA's "other resources" was struck
from the bill to avoid any situations where, for example, the KTA would
purchase vehicles or equipment and give it to KDOT as a way to fund
projects outside the turnpike.

After all the amendments, there are some who say that this bill is
nothing but a restatement of current law and could have been a
resolution just urging continued cooperation. But, the bill does repeal
over 90 statutes, so something must be changing. As I read through the
long list of statutes, some appear to be redundant and others seem to
have expired – such as studies or projects to be done by a certain
date. I counted at least 20 of the statutes being repealed that deal
with budgeting issues. There are also some questionable repeals,
including a provision that states KTA bonds are not a debt to the state
and only payable by KTA revenues, and another that prohibits KTA members
or employees from contracting with KTA to avoid ethical and conflict of
interest issues – a basic ethics requirement for most contracting
authorities. Of the 31 statutes being retained, I found some that
needed to join the list of repealed statutes like one that directs a
feasibility study to be done by December 1981, and one that gives law
enforcement duties to the KS Highway Patrol on the turnpike but refers
to the duties described in KSA 74-20a03 that was repealed in 1972.

So what I am trying to say is: that despite days of testimony and
discussion, it is still not clear what this bill exactly does and no one
can fully explain its consequences. There was no organized study of the
impacts and there was no fiscal assessment - a fiscal note is normally
prepared for every bill that explains the bill's budgetary impact on
the State.

Innovative School Districts

This week we debated and voted on HB2319. This bill was named "The
Innovative School Districts" bill. The Senate also debated and voted
on their version of the bill, which was virtually identical. These
bills would exempt some school districts (10 in the House version and 28
in the Senate version) from almost every Kansas statute except for
special education, issuing of bonds, and election of the school board,
KPERS, and the school funding formula.

The Kansas City Kansas School District testified in favor of the bill,
but later submitted a statement that they did not necessarily want to be
exempt from ALL other statutes. The KCK School District is one of two
districts in Kansas that currently are already exempt from the normal
Kansas Assessment process. They previously requested and were granted
the exception because they wanted to use the ACT, and its family of
tests that build up to the ACT, as its method to assess student
progress. Proponents said "HB2319 cuts all the red tape and lets
teachers be free to innovate." Opponents of HB2319 stated that with
such a sweeping exemption, these districts would not have to do a long
list of things, such as: hire certified teachers and staff, fund the
gifted or financial literacy programs, and use competitive bidding.
There would be no attendance rules or open meeting rules, the districts
could drive their buses into other districts to take the best athletes
and/or academic achievers, and there would be no collective bargaining
or due process rights for teachers and other employees.

Keep in Touch

You can track my activities on my website www.meier4kansas.com, my
FaceBook page www.facebook.com/Meier4Kansas, and Twitter
www.twitter.com/melaniemeier. I am privileged and honored to be your
voice in the Kansas Capitol.

If I can ever be of assistance to you, please feel free to contact me at
home or in Topeka. My office is on the 4th floor of the Capitol, Room
451-S. To write to me, my office address is Kansas State Capitol,
Topeka, KS 66612. You can also reach me at the legislative hotline,
1-800-432-3924. Additionally, you can e-mail me at
melanie.meier@house.ks.gov. And do not forget to follow the legislative
session online at www.kslegislature.org.

If you need to directly contact a particular agency in state government,
you can find useful telephone numbers online at
http://da.state.ks.us/phonebook.

Adventures in the Statehouse, Vol 2013 Issue 7

Melanie Meier's Adventures in the Statehouse
Kansas House of Representatives
Volume 2013, Issue 7: February 25 – March 1, 2013

In This Issue

- Turnaround
- Military Student Second Count
- Lobbyist Bill Failed
- Longevity Pay Bill Failed
- Keep in Touch

Turnaround

The legislature reached turnaround day last Friday. Turnaround is the
last day to debate and pass bills in each chamber before sending them to
the other. Next week we will start hearings on the Senate bills we
received over the weekend. With a couple of snowy days recently, the
House had to work overtime to get as many of the bills completed as
possible.

I counted 92 bills that passed the House and headed to the Senate this
past week! We debated a few more than that, but occasionally a bill
that makes it to the House floor for debate does not survive to a final
action vote. The Speaker did "bless" a few bills that we did not
finish, so those bills will remain on the House calendar for possible
debate despite it being past the deadline.

Military Student Second Count

One bill that made it through the House and is on its way to the Senate
is HB2109. You probably won't read about it in the headlines but it
is a very important bill to our community and other communities near
military installations. It passed 109 to 14 and had the full support of
our local Representatives. All HB2109 does is extend for 5 years, the
practice of counting the children of active duty military in grades K-12
a second time in the spring. The purpose is to provide extra funding to
local schools if there is a large increase of students since the fall
due to military transfers. This practice started about 8 years ago when
the nation's conflicts caused tremendous turnover of military families
and the added stress of multiple deployments. Now it is important that
the Senators from areas without a military installation understand the
bill and vote to continue the second count.

Some background information: the federal government actually provides
federal impact aid to the state to help pay for the education of the
children of active duty service members. This is because the vast
majority of active duty service members are not residents of the state
and do not pay income tax here (and for those who live on the
installation - no property tax). In Kansas, the state keeps 70% of that
money and spreads it out to all schools in the state as part of its
equalization process. The schools with the military children actually
only get their share of the remaining 30%. This 30% share is extremely
important to our Fort Leavenworth school district, because they have no
way to raise local money or issue bonds. There are no property tax
payers on the installation. In fact, when the state raises its portion
of the state Local Option Budget, the Fort Leavenworth school district
has to pay its share of the state LOB out of its portion of the 30% of
federal impact aid. So when you hear about any raise in the state
portion of LOB, it is actually a cut in funding for Fort Leavenworth
schools!

There were opponents to HB2109. They feel it is not fair that the
military students are counted a second time in order to adjust the
funding. Opponents say they understand and appreciate the military and
the extra stresses their children go through by moving so often, having
one or more parents gone and in harm's way for long periods of time,
and others living with a parent that never returns or returns severely
wounded; but these opponents feel the military already has too much
special treatment and are opposed to the second count.

The supporters of HB2109 pointed out the fact that all schools in Kansas
benefit from the mere presence of military students in just a few
districts by getting 70% of the money sent to the state just for them.
They also stated that there is a Base Realignment and Closure process
coming in the next couple of years and Kansas needs to prove its support
of the military to ensure we do not lose any of our military
installations. The biggest argument for HB2109 was that is it just the
right thing to do to support our military families and uphold our
military student compact with other states – to provide a stable
environment and consistent educational experience for all children even
if they are moving in and out of the state throughout the school year.
Just think about it, if 20 students leave the school due to transfers,
it is highly unlikely that the exact same mix of students will transfer
in.. They will be a variety of grades and educational levels and the
schools never know the number enrolling until the first day of school
and it continually changes after that! They have to remain flexible in
classrooms, text books, teachers, counselors, etc.

Lobbyist Bill Failed

Occasionally, a bill will make it out of the Committee process but not
survive the debate in the House chamber. One such bill was HB2314 that
proposed raising the monetary value limit of gifts that lobbyists can
give to government officials from $100 to $500 and raise the lower limit
of gifts that do not have to be reported from $2 to $15. Lobbyists had
requested the bill because they said that inflation causes them to keep
burdensome records of every bit of money they spend on legislators and
other government officials. One Representative attempted to save the
bill by proposing an amendment to make the limit on gifts $250 instead
of the proposed $500. Most legislators felt this bill was not a good
idea, it failed on a vote of 4 to 118!

Longevity Pay Bill Failed

Another bill that made it out of Committee but did not survive the House
Chamber was HB2178. It was defeated by a vote of 42 yea to 78 nay.
This bill proposed removing the requirement for the State to pay for
employee longevity bonuses. The State agencies testified that longevity
pay is a very important incentive to try and keep state employees, to
cut down turnover, and is much more affordable than the high cost of
constantly training new personnel. Kansas State employees have not had
a raise in many years, even a cost of living increase, so there is a
tendency to leave for anything better that shows up. Some Legislators
see the word "bonus" and feel that bonuses are not essential so they
should be cut. These are bonuses of $40 per year over 10 years and have
a limit of 25 years. While they are not huge, they do make a big
difference for state employees that earn wages often less than $10 an
hour.

The real issue is that the agencies have been told that there will be no
money in the budget for longevity pay, so they have to come up with the
money from other areas of their budget. They are put "between a rock
and a hard place" by the Legislature. Most agencies find the money by
holding positions open and not hiring new people when someone leaves, or
postponing hiring a replacement for months in order to use that salary
to fund the longevity pay or other areas of their budget that they are
short. But this results in compounding the issue by what I have learned
in my Budget Committee, that when the State cuts these "open
positions" that were not filled, the legislature is actually cutting
the agencies' budgets. It sounds inconsequential enough – "if the
position wasn't filled then the agency didn't need it"- but the
reality is that they needed to fill the positions but were forced to use
the salary elsewhere.


Keep in Touch

You can track my activities on my website www.meier4kansas.com, my
FaceBook page www.facebook.com/Meier4Kansas, and Twitter
www.twitter.com/melaniemeier. I am privileged and honored to be your
voice in the Kansas Capitol.

If I can ever be of assistance to you, please feel free to contact me at
home or in Topeka. My office is on the 4th floor of the Capitol, Room
451-S. To write to me, my office address is Kansas State Capitol,
Topeka, KS 66612. You can also reach me at the legislative hotline,
1-800-432-3924. Additionally, you can e-mail me at
melanie.meier@house.ks.gov. And do not forget to follow the legislative
session online at www.kslegislature.org.

If you need to directly contact a particular agency in state government,
you can find useful telephone numbers online at
http://da.state.ks.us/phonebook.