Adventures in the Statehouse, Vol 2013 Issue 12

Representative Melanie Meier's
Adventures in the Statehouse
Volume 2013, Issue 12: April 1-5, 2013

In this Issue:

Last Week by the Numbers
Veteran and Military Bills
Leavenworth County Sponsored Bill
The Budget and Taxes
VCAP Advisory Board

Last Week by the Numbers

46 - The Governor has signed 46 bills into law so far this year.
22 - There are 22 bills still in conference committees, waiting to be
negotiated between the House and Senate versions. There are many more
waiting to hit the Governor's desk.
39 - The House voted to adopt 39 Conference Committee Reports this past
week.
5 - The House concurred with Senate amendments to 5 House bills.
0 - There have been 0 vetoes by the Governor, yet!
8 - The Legislature reconvenes on May 8, 2013, for the "wrap up" or
"veto" session.

Veteran and Military Bills

There are quite a few Veteran and Military Bills that have been signed
by the Governor, are on the Governor's desk awaiting signature, or on
the way to the Governor's desk. He has already signed HB2181, that
authorizes licensing bodies to accept certain online distance education
courses toward licensure requirements for military service member
applicants; and SB28, which allows The Adjutant General to accept
federal land at Crisis City out in Salina.

On his desk are SB27, which expands eligibility for scholarships for
National Guard students with combat service after 9-11; and SB136,
which allows veterans to request the designation of VETERAN on their
drivers license or state identification card; and HB2212, which amends
the method for calculating a Veteran Service Organizations' required
"grant match" for the Veteran Claims Assistance Program.

On the way to his desk are HB2078, which requires the acceptance of
equivalent military training and experience toward Kansas professional
licenses' educational requirements; and SB23, which is a school
finance bill that includes the continuation of funding to cover the
expense of high student and teacher turnover rates due to military
transfers - commonly referred to as 'military second count'.

Leavenworth County Sponsored Bill

Our own County Attorney's bill, HB2278 is one of the bills on the
Governor's desk awaiting signature. It is the bill to increase the
penalties for the theft of firearms. Up until now, Kansas law treated
the theft of a firearm the same as stealing anything else valued at less
than $1000. Our prosecutors and law enforcement recognized that the
theft of firearms is a way for persons to obtain firearms when they
cannot meet the requirement to purchase a handgun legally or they do not
want to have their name on record for purchasing a firearm. The Lansing
Chief of Police and other proponents testified this is especially
prevalent in cases dealing with drug distribution. The Legislature
agreed and the bill passed the House 117-4, the Senate 40-0, and is
expected to be signed by the Governor shortly.

The Budget and Taxes

The Legislature adjourned late Friday night with no budget and with
several tax bills still in limbo. The Senate and House Conference
Committee met a total of 10 times to negotiate the State's budget, but
little progress was made. The Speaker of the House had stated in his
press conferences, that a tax bill should be passed first and we should
wait for the next revenue estimates (scheduled to be released on April
15th) before settling the budget; so the House negotiators broke off the
conference committee meetings until the Legislature returns to Topeka on
May 8th.

The House unanimously rejected a motion to concur with the Senate's
proposed tax plan on Friday. HB2059 would permanently raise the sales
tax six-tenths of a percent in July. It would add up to $800 million in
tax increases that hit every Kansan, those with lower income especially.
It repeals the tax deduction for gambling losses and reduces all other
itemized deductions (except for charitable contributions) by 24% in
2013, 41% in 2014-15, 65% in 2016 and 94% in 2017. It would introduce a
new series of income tax rates that would go down each year until 2017
with the two brackets ending up at 3.5% and 1.9%. Then after 2017,
there would be a formula to bring the rates to zero.

The House plan would make increased state revenue a prerequisite to
further income tax cuts and would allow the sales tax to drop from 6.3%
to 5.7% in July, as currently scheduled. SB84 requires that a formula
be used in the future to lower the income tax rates once the Department
of Revenue could verify that the State had experienced growth over 2%.
Your individual itemized deductions would be cut 24% in tax year 2013,
but would not go down again until the growth over 2% formula is used.

The tax plan and budget will take center stage when the legislature
reconvenes in May.

VCAP Advisory Board

As a member of the Veterans Claims Assistance Program Advisory Board, I
learned some disturbing information about the House's proposed budget.
Under the original Governor's budget , the Kansas Commission on
Veterans Affairs (KCVA)'s budget was maintained at current levels.
They are currently short two Veteran Service Representatives (VSRs) in
their Salina and Hayes offices. These two offices are making
appointments to assist veterans in processing and filing their claims
with the Veterans Administration up to three months out. With the
VA's poor average processing time of over 12 months, this delay in
getting an appointment is adding another three months to the veteran's
wait. However, with the House's budget proposal that "caps" next
years salary budgets of each agency at what they had already paid in the
nine months from 1 July 2012 to 15 March 2013, the KCVA is at risk at
having to lay off two more VSRs! They are a small agency and two
positions may not seem like much, but they are already behind and this
would just compound the situation.

This just compounds my concern, as I mentioned in my earlier reports, of
some of the unacceptable results of this House Appropriations "salary
cap" proposal on our public safety organizations. I am especially
concerned about the Department of Corrections having to lay off 94
employees when they are already dangerously short of correctional
officers. Unfortunately, attempts by myself and others to make budget
cuts by prioritizing instead of blanket cuts across the board have been
unsuccessful to date.

Adventures in the Statehouse, Vol 2013 Issue 11

Melanie Meier's Adventures in the Statehouse
Kansas House of Representatives

Volume 2013, Issue 11: March 25 - 29, 2013

In This Issue

- Now on to Conference Committee Reports
- Change to Docket Fees - Another Bill with No Proponents
- More Tax Exemptions?
- Boat Taxes
- Veteran Bills
- Who is on the conference committees?
- Keep in Touch

Now on to Conference Committee Reports

Week 11 was a short week but jam packed with bills. The House and
Senate put in a few long days to vote on bills passed by the other
chamber, and if modified send them into the Conference Committee
process. Now Conference Committees (made up of the Chair, Vice Chair
and Ranking Minority Member from each chamber - six people) will be
meeting to hash out the differences between the House and Senate
versions. Once they come to an agreement, the bills must be presented
to each chamber for another vote to ensure the chambers agree with the
conference committee changes. This is the time of year that many bills
are combined into one report and bills that did not even make it through
the process and voted on may be combined into conference reports. A
bill that a Representative or Senator may have worked on all year could
be attached to bills that they hate.

Change to Docket Fees - Another Bill with No Proponents

HB2338 is a bill that was introduced in the House Appropriations
Committee but no one stepped forward as a proponent or would testify in
support of it. There seems to be many of such bills this year. HB2338
would take the money that is raised by docket fees for 14 special legal
funds and send it to the State General Fund. Representatives of
organizations such as the Family Crisis Center, The Kansas Coalition
against Sexual and Domestic Violence, and Safehomes testified in
opposition to the bill. The Kansas
Judicial Branch along with the non-state agencies that deal mostly with
victim support and child advocacy, testified that the bill jeopardizes
the funding for the operation of their respective organizations. Our
local CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) and Alliance Against
Family Violence, are examples of such agencies.

The House Appropriations Committee amended the bill to delay the
implementation of the bill until FY 2015, to allow agencies to submit
amended budgetary requests, because with passage of this bill they will
be required to appear in front of the Legislature to request funding.
Representatives who have served in the Legislature for some time, argued
against the bill saying that the current system was set up because these
types of agencies were not getting the money they needed back when the
state had money and this bill will just make it easier to sweep the fee
funds for other purposes. This bill passed the House Yea 67 No 52, and
is now in the Senate Ways and Means Committee which has not yet taken
action.

More Tax Exemptions?

After the House passed its tax plan that would reduce individual
allowable income tax deductions by 24% per year (whether your
individual tax rate goes down or not) several new bills appeared this
week that create new exemptions to property and sales tax. One such
bill was SB72, that would exempt privately owned health clubs from
paying property tax. It was introduced on behalf of a health club owner
in Wichita that feels threatened by the YMCA and other non-profit
organizations that do not pay property taxes. The City of Leavenworth
and Leavenworth County commissioners have voiced their opposition to
this bill. You may have read about this in a recent Leavenworth Times
article.

Another example was HB2379, that was heard by the House Taxation
Committee on Friday, March 22nd, and passed out "at the rail" on Monday,
March 25th. "At the rail" means the committee met just outside the
House chamber in the hallway and "worked" the bill to pass it out. I
happened to be passing by in the hall just after their vote as the
Committee Assistant was running amongst the gaggle of legislators to try
and figure out who was in attendance and how they voted. She even asked
me as I walked by, and I am not on that committee! In my opinion, that
was not exactly the best method to discuss and vote on a bill.

HB2379 would declare federal gold and silver bullion as legal tender in
Kansas so it would be exempt from sales tax. The bill goes on to say
that no one has to accept it as legal tender, and who would? Gold and
silver bullion is sold as collector items or for investment by its
weight and the current value of gold and silver. I can not imagine
someone pulling out a piece of gold bullion at the local grocery store
to buy a quart of milk.

Boat Taxes

Remember the Constitutional Amendment we voted on last November that
adjusted how a boat would be taxed in Kansas? Well, we finally debated
HB2244, the follow up bill to that amendment. The bill was originally
introduced to completely eliminate taxes on watercraft by 2016, but the
House Taxation Committee amended the bill to lower the value assessments
to 11.5% in 2014 and then 5% in 2015 and thereafter (so not eliminating
these taxes entirely). It also added a stipulation that for every
watercraft worth $1000 or less, the tax would be a flat rate of $12.

If you recall, this was all started by the Kansas Department of
Wildlife, Parks & Tourism in an attempt to entice Kansans to actually
register their watercraft in Kansas rather than in surrounding states
with much lower property tax on luxury items. That way, the revenues to
KDWP&T would go up in registration fees. The idea was that the property
taxes revenue would even out by more people paying less. The bill
passed but may not be in its final form as one Representative pointed
out that boats worth $1000 or less will pay the flat tax rate of $12,
but a boat worth $1050 will pay taxes on 5% of its assessed value of
$52.50, which would be $7.09. This does not seem to add up correctly;
maybe the Senate will adjust it accordingly?

Veteran Bills

The House Veteran, Military Affairs & Homeland Security Committee will
actually be part of the Conference Committee process this year. This is
my third year as the Ranking Minority Member of our committee and this
will be my first time on a Conference Committee. The Senate does not
have its own Veterans Committee, so our bills are usually assigned to
other committees to work.

This week we will be meeting in conference with the Senate on HB2078 and
SB27. A short update: SB27 had to do with the National Guard
scholarship program for veterans of combat operations since 9-11.
HB2078 had to do with licensing agencies accepting military experience
and training in consideration of civilian licensure for nurses and EMS;
the Senate combined it with HB2077 which was almost the same bill but
includes all licenses in the state.

The Senate also voted on HB2212 and made no amendments, so it is on its
way to the Governor's desk for signature. HB2212 is the very important
bill to update how the Veteran Service Organizations can make their
required matching payments for the VCAP grant program. The House passed
SB136, that would allow someone to place the designation of VETERAN on
their drivers license. The House amended SB136 to say VETERAN would be
on the front of the license. Hopefully, the Senate will concur so it
will head to the Governor's desk this week as well.

One military bill that the Veteran, Military Affairs & Homeland Security
Committee will not be on the conference committee is HB2109, which
worries me. This is the bill to extend the second count of military
pupils in K-12 education. It was amended by the Senate to correct some
technical language, but the House Education Budget Committee decided to
non-concur and asked for a conference committee instead of concurring
with the change and sending it to the Governor for signature. The
conference committee is made up of Senate Education and House Education
Budget Committees. Often, very important bills such as this, are used as
vehicles for other bills that may not be too popular. Two of the House
members of the conference committee assure me that the bill is safe and
will be passed, but this is the time of conference committee
reports.......

Who is on Conference Committees?

You can learn which conference committees are considering which bills at
http://www.kslegislature.org/li/b2013_14/committees/conference/. This
webpage also lists the Senators and Representatives assigned to the
conference committees.

Keep in Touch

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