Governor Kelly outlined her vision for Kansas in her first State of the State Address last night and the focus was on three areas: 1) funding our K-12 schools to end the “cycle of litigation,” 2) expanding Medicaid to provide health insurance for 150,000 more Kansans, and 3) restoring our foster care system so that children are cared for. One thing the Governor’s budget does not include is a tax
This morning Budget Director Larry Campbell appeared before a joint meeting of the House Appropriations and Senate Ways and Means Committees to put some meat on the bones of her speech. Campbell served as a Republican State Representative from Olathe before being picked by former Governor Colyer to serve as Budget Director. Governor Kelly has kept Campbell on. He is noted for his even temper, pragmatic outlook, and ability to work “across the aisle” to find solutions to complex problems.
Kelly’s budget is a one year budget except for K-12 education with is a two-year budget. For the past eight years, the Legislature has adopted two-year budgets but Kelly is breaking with that cycle this year, instead focusing on moving ahead for one year while the state continues to recover from the failed Brownback tax experiment that left Kansas on the brink of bankruptcy.
Under Kelly’s budget State Foundation Aid (BASE) would rise from the current $4165 in 2019 to $4436 in 2020, $4569 in 2021, $4706 in 2022, and $4846 in 2023. Beginning in 2024 the base would rise by the Consumer Price Index each year. This funding would provide for the inflation factor that the Supreme Court noted in the last Gannon school finance decision.
The proposal would:
- Add $521 million from 2020 through 2023 for State Foundation Aid,
- Fully fund LOB State Aid each year,
- Continue funding for mental health intervention teams and the Juvenile Transitional Crisis Center in 2020,
- Fully fund ACT and/or WorkKeys tests in 2020, and
- Include $950,000 for the Education Super Highway, which will enable $9.5 million in matching federal funds for rural internet broadband initiatives.
Kelly asks the Legislature to pass her school funding plan by February 28 in order to satisfy the Supreme Court ruling.
Here’s what Governor Kelly had to say about education in her speech last night:
[T]hroughout Kansas’ decades-long debate over school funding, we’ve fallen into a troubling pattern. It begins with a promise from elected leaders to fund our schools. Then a failure to follow through on that promise.
That is going to change this year. This year, we will end this cycle of litigation and meet the needs of our students and teachers once and for all.
The days of doing the bare minimum to fund our schools are over. It stops now.
Remember, just a few short years ago, schools closed early because they literally could not afford to stay open. Test scores dropped for the first time in a decade. Class sizes grew – some with more than 30 kids in a single classroom.
Superintendents and principals struggled to hold their districts together, often taking on multiple roles like counselor or bus driver. Sometimes they even refused to be paid, just to keep their budgets above water.
Teachers fled the state. And those who stayed received an average salary that ranked 42nd in the nation.
The consequences were tangible and the scars are lasting.
Never again.
The consequences were tangible and the scars are lasting.
Never again.We’re going to properly fund our schools this year. And next year. And the year after that. Every year, every month, every day that I’m governor.
And we’re going to make sure our schools prepare our children for a changing economy. Modern classrooms with modern technologies.
Because at the end of the day, we need our children tograduate high school or college or technical school so they can find jobs right here in Kansas. So they can stay here and raise their families close to home.
