By Mike Shields, KHI News Service, January 30, 2009
TOPEKA — The House now has its version of a bill to balance the 2009 state budget and is expected to debate it sometime early next week.
A measure that would shift or cut $327 million from current fiscal year spending was narrowly approved Friday by the House Appropriations Committee after about four hours of discussion.
The bill would trim about $7.5 million less than the rescission bill passed by the full Senate earlier this week, taking less from various social service programs, the state universities and community colleges but significantly more from K-12 schools.
Committee members reviewed a list detailing the reserve funds currently held by each of the state’s public school districts and a majority agreed the districts should “share the pain” of proposed budget cuts that would spare few, if any, other state programs.
The governor’s recommended budget for the balance of the spending year that ends June 30, would have largely spared K-12 schools cuts, though it wouldn’t have delivered the additional dollars the districts were expecting for enrollment growth. That failure to make up for the enrollment growth would have been the equivalent of a $22 per student decrease in state aid.
The bill approved in the Senate by a coalition of Democrats and conservative Republicans and over the objections of Senate GOP leadership would have cut state aid to districts by the equivalent of $33 per student.
The plan approved by the House Appropriations Committee would cut state aid to schools by $88 per student or a total 1.5 percent reduction in state K-12 spending equaling about $50 million. According to the education department’s list, the school districts have total contingency reserves of about $119 million. A few districts reported zero balances in their reserve funds. Some of the larger districts had several million dollars each.
“We’re letting the air out of the tires, 1.5 percent,” said Rep. Kevin Yoder, the Overland Park Republican who chairs the committee.
Democrats predicted the cuts would invite a lawsuit because they would not affect school districts equally. And some rural Republicans complained their districts would suffer disproportionately under the plan.
The committee also approved an amendment offered by Rep. Jason Watkins, R-Wichita, that would shift $2.9 million from the Kansas Bioscience Authority’s account to the Wichita Center for Graduate Medical Education. The center trains most of the state’s rural doctors and the two hospitals in the teaching consortium have threatened to reduce the number of residents they train, if the state doesn’t pay more of the program’s cost.
“Without WCGME, we probably wouldn’t have doctors in half our small counties out there,” said Rep. John Faber, R-Brewster.
The House version included about $16 million more for social service caseloads, mostly for home and community based services for those who are physically or developmentally disabled. That funding, proponents said, would eliminate the waiting list for services for the physically disabled through June 30 while providing services to some developmentally disabled persons who have been waiting for them.
Lawmakers are trying to close a projected $300 million budget gap for the few remaining months of the fiscal year, though some have predicted it could grow to $400 million or $500 million because of the slumping economy.
The revenue department on Friday reported that January tax receipts were $513 million; $21 million less than had been forecast. It was the third straight month that tax collections were below estimates.
The governor’s 2009 budget plan would have cut or shifted $200 million to fill the expected budget hole. The Senate’s plan would cut or shift about $335 million in spending; and the House plan would cut or shift about $327 million.
-Mike Shields is a staff writer for KHI News Service, which specializes in coverage of health issues facing Kansans. He can be reached at mshields@khi.org or at 785-233-5443, ext. 123.