House Ed Budget Committee sends two bills to the floor

Two bills were moved out of the House K-12 Budget Committee last night – one dealing with funding, the other with policy. Both bills will now go to the full House for debate next week. And both bills are opposed by KNEA and the education community generally.

But the first action was to deal with SB 142, the Senate’s school finance bill that represents the best response available at this time to the Gannon school finance decision. A motion by Jim Ward (D-Wichita) to pass the bill out favorably was defeated on a 5 to 7 vote – a number which would be repeated several times during the meeting.

Next up was Senate Bill 16 which dealt with naming evidence-based programs that could be paid for with at-risk funds. The bill was brought by Mike O’Neal on behalf of JAG-K (Jobs for America’s Graduates). The Senate added Boys and Girls Clubs to the bill and sent it over to the House.

On a motion by Kyle Hoffman (R-Coldwater), the bill was gutted and a new bill created. House Sub for SB 16 now contains nearly all of the education policy changes sought by House K-12 Budget Committee Chair Kristey Williams (R-Augusta) and the conservative legislators on the committee. There are no funding pieces in the bill at all.

Pieces that were removed from the bill include the bullying task force, the vouchers for targets of bullying, and the restrictions on roofing contracts. The limit on funding bilingual students is changed from four years to five. The 15% cap on unencumbered balances is removed and replaced with an audit of unencumbered balances by the Division of Legislative Post Audit.

The bill still removes the requirement that 92% of the excess costs of special education be reimbursed. It keeps all the new accountability reporting, the study of graduation requirements in the hope of letting financial literacy and computer science count as math or science credits, the establishment of an IT Commission, the extension of the Dyslexia Task Force, and O’Neal’s JAG-K language but without Boys and Girls Clubs. The bill also creates a new bullying hotline.

Also included is a change to the tuition tax credit scholarship (voucher) program that will tend to concentrate vouchers in urban areas. Currently these vouchers are available to students in the 100 lowest performing schools in the state. The change in this bill is to limit the vouchers to the 100 lowest performing elementary schools in the state.

The amendment creating Sub for SB 16 was adopted on a vote of 7 to 5 and the bill was subsequently passed out of committee on a party line vote of 8 to 4.

Sub for SB 16 will do nothing to address the Gannon decision and parts of it could jeopardize equity in our current formula created additional legal problems in the Courts. KNEA opposes Sub for SB 16.

This action was followed by a new Hoffman motion to amend HB 2395, Williams’ school finance plan, to take out all the policy pieces that are now contained in Sub for SB 16.

As amended, HB 2395 (now Sub for HB 2395) would provide about $90 million in new funding but splits that funding essentially half and half between BASE increases and two weightings – a slight increase in at-risk weighting and the creation of new “behavioral health intervention weighting.” The Senate plan in SB 142 would apply the full $90 million increase to the BASE without messing about with a formula that has been deemed to be constitutional.

But there are other very significant and very troubling changes. First, instead of honoring the promises of the 2017 and 2018 school finance actions, this bill repeals entirely the BASE increases in the last two years. SB 142 has all four years funded. This new bill also deletes the current provision that calls for an annual CPI increase to school funding once the Montoy Safe Harbor is reached. Sub for HB 2395 ends all commitments to school funding before reaching the Montoy Safe Harbor and beyond.

If Sub for HB 2395 were to become that Legislature’s response to Gannon, we will likely remain in court far into the future. The best hope for bringing Gannon to an end is to pass SB 142. KNEA opposes Sub for HB 2395.

TAKE ACTION NOW!

Both of these bills (Sub for SB 16 and Sub for HB 2395) will be available next week for debate on the House floor. We urge all supporters of our public schools to contact their state representatives now. CLICK Here to contact your Representative. Ask him/her to vote NO on Sub for SB 16 and Sub for HB 2395 and to pass SB 142 instead. It is time to move a responsible bill to the Supreme Court – that bill is SB 142.

Will the Senate take action on Medicaid expansion?

Thursday, on a vote of 69 to 54, the House passed KanCare expansion, an action that could bring health insurance coverage to as many as 150,000 currently uninsured Kansans. KanCare is the state’s Medicaid program. The expansion is allowed under the Affordable Care Act. The state will pay 10% of the cost while the federal government is required to pay 90%.

Both the House and Senate have voted previously to expand KanCare only to have the action vetoed by then-Governor Sam Brownback. A motion to override Brownback’s veto passed the House but fell a vote short in the Senate.

House leadership has been determined to stop to KanCare expansion but the majority of members have been just as determined to pass it. And on Wednesday, when HB 2066 came to the floor, they got their chance. Kathy Wolfe Moore (D-Kansas City) made a motion to gut the bill and replace the contents with KanCare expansion. This action was necessary because Brenda Landwehr (R-Wichita), the chair of the House Health and Human Services Committee and a hardcore opponent of expansion refused to give a hearing to a bill on expansion.

The amendment was ruled not germane by the House Rules Committee Chair but the ruling was overturned by the members on a vote of 55 to sustain the ruling and 62 to overturn. After a long debate, the Wolfe Moore amendment passed on a vote of 69 to 53 and the bill advanced to final action on a vote of 70 to 54.

Now the bill goes to the Senate but time is almost up for consideration. KanCare expansion is needed in Kansas. We have already seen four rural hospitals close (Independence, Fort Scott, Oswego, and Horton) with many more on the verge of closing. Expansion will help them by paying for more preventative care and limiting the practice of using the emergency room for care. Expansion will help many working Kansans caught in the gap between KanCare eligibility and eligibility for ACA health insurance subsidies. They earn too much to qualify for KanCare but not enough to be eligible to get financial help to buy private insurance.

KanCare expansion will create jobs, protect hospitals and communities, and improve health and financial security for 150,000 Kansans. Here’s what some legislators had to say about why they voted YES on expansion:

  • “I discerningly vote “yes” on HB 2066… Rural hospitals, mental health, and the working poor are losing. While imperfect, today’s decision gives them a chance. Healthcare cannot be solved exclusively in Kansas; let’s resoundingly IMPLORE FEDERAL dialogue, action, and results.” MARK SAMSEL
  • “I vote yes on HB 2066. It ensures that thousands of Kansans can look forward to a healthier and more productive future. And at a time when 86% of Kansas hospitals have negative operating margins, this proposal will provide immediate help for their bottom line, stabilizing operations, aiding in staff recruitment, and providing a lifeline to much-needed retooling and reconfiguring of health care delivery. It has been said that in Kansas a person’s zip code is a greater determinant of health outcomes than genetics. For rural Kansans, HB 2066 gives hope that it need not always be so.” DON HINEMAN, BRAD RALPH, JOHN P. WHEELER, JR., JIM KARLESKINT, SUZI CARLSON, SUSAN CONCANNON, LEONARD A. MASTRONI
  • “Expanding accessibility to preventative healthcare will alleviate crisis health situations, reduce hospital operating losses, and ultimately lead to healthier rural communities. I vote YES on HB 2066.” ADAM SMITH

TAKE ACTION NOW!

CLICK Here to contact your Senator now. Ask them to take action on House Bill 2066 and expand KanCare. It is time to help working Kansans get the health care they deserve; time to step up for our rural hospitals; time to do the right thing. Ask them to call HB 2066 to the floor of the Senate for action.