BUDGET: Education funding largely untouched in effort to avoid a Sebelius veto. Final passage came Thursday.

House passes budget-trimming bill

An amendment that could reduce the education cuts that were voted out of the House Appropriations Committee last week passed Wednesday on a 72-46 vote.

The amendment was a key component in the House version of the budget bill, a spending measure that could mean more than a $300 million reduction - a difference of more than $30 million from the Senate's version, which was voted on last Monday.

The education funding revision was introduced by Rep. Kevin Yoder, a Republican from Overland Park. If the final measure passes Thursday, it would decrease the impact on K-12 school funding by reducing the Appropriation Committee’s approved 1.5 percent cut to a 1 percent cut - a difference of $16 million. [ Read more...]

Kansans who spend $5.5 billion a year on K-12 education 'deserve to know how every dollar is spent.' Bill follows important Blackwell endorsement

Huelskamp bill pushes for school district spending transparency

Kansas school districts, far and away the state’s biggest consumer of tax dollars, would be required to post on a state website information detailing their financial dealings, under a bill introduced Thursday by Sen. Tim Huelskamp, a Fowler Republican.

“Kansas businesses and citizens spend nearly $5.5 billion to educate our children – they deserve to know how every dollar is spent,” Huelskamp said in a statement given to Kansas Liberty late Thursday afternoon.

The state website, called KanView, allows citizens to review financial transactions by agencies, salaries of public officials, etc. [ Read more...]

ABORTION: Spending tax dollars providing abortions overseas may help Dems with Planned Parenthood, but not with America

Obama's first month earns wide approval - except on abortion

A new Gallup poll has great news for Pres. Barack Obama.

His general approval ratings are way up, and on a wide range of foreign and domestic issues, the new president's moves are seen as positive by as many as 76 percent of Americans. Even most Republicans are high on Obama.

But on one issue, Obama strikes a sour note. [ Read more...]

Down-syndrome teen dies after late-term abortion. Operation Rescue says 2005 closure of case by Board of Healing Arts was 'politically motivated.'

Pro-life group seeks re-opening of Tiller teen-death investigation

The pro-life group Operation Rescue is asking the Kansas Board of Healing Arts to re-open an investigation into the death of a Texas teenager with Down syndrome who died in 2005 after receiving a late-term abortion at a Wichita clinic owned and operated by Dr. George Tiller.

The charge is one of the most serious allegations ever lodged against Tiller's clinic.

Troy Newman, director of Operation Rescue, said in a statement Thursday the new complaint filed with the board was based on new information it had received from various sources, including the victim’s paternal grandmother. [ Read more...]

BALLOT BATTLE: Similar bill was vetoed last year by Sebelius, who said providing photo ID would be 'burdensome.'

Voter ID bill to be debated in Elections Committee Wednesday

The House Elections Committee will hold a public hearing Wednesday on a voter ID bill introduced by Rep. Mike Burgess, a Topeka Republican.

Its chances of passage might be good, but its long-term survival may be in doubt. A similar bill was passed by the Legislature last year but vetoed by Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who argued providing a photo ID before being allowed to vote would be "burdensome" and disenfranchise some voters.

This time, however, the bill's sponsor thinks he has the arguments that may trump Sebelius' worries. [ Read more...]

Two versions in one day. In this one, 16 different forms of ID could be used to verify eligibility - and no photo required. Activist group still opposed.

Thornburgh offers yet another Voter ID bill

It's easy to identify a hot issue in Topeka these days. Just look for the tag "Voter ID."

Two bills seeking to insure that only eligible voters cast ballots in Kansas elections are making the rounds. Wednesday morning, Rep. Mike Burgess's Voter ID bill was debated in a House committee.

Wednesday afternoon, Secretary of State Ron Thornburgh told Kansas Liberty he would try again to win legislative approval for his version of a Voter ID bill. [ Read more...]

LAW AND ORDER: Kelly: Voting for a bill that would add time to sentences is 'fiscally irresponsible.'

Senate panel OKs stiffer sentences for armed drug felons

The Senate Judiciary Committee passed a bill Monday that would require offenders to serve an extra 12 to 24 months in prison if they are in possession of a firearm while committing a drug felony.

In addition to a sentence already imposed from a drug felony, if an offender carries a firearm, the firearm offense would net the offender an extra 12 months to a sentence. If a firearm were brandished while committing the drug crime, the offender would be sentenced to an additional 15 months in prison. If the firearm were discharged, then the offender would face an additional 24 months.

The proposal, Senate Bill 26, originally sought tougher guidelines, with additional 60, 84 or 120 months added to the offender’s sentence, but was amended in committee by John Vratil, Senate vice president and member of the Judiciary Committee. [ Read more...]

GREENHOUSE GAS: Don't like coal? Here's your chance to prove it - once KCC approves the plan.

Bill would allow citizens to choose wind power, for a price

A substantial number of Kansans from the Kansas City and Lawrence area supported Gov. Kathleen Sebelius' battle to deny permits to expand the Sunflower Electric plant in western Kansas.

Her claim: Coal as a source of electrical power is harmful to the health of Kansans.

A House bill introduced last week would give coal opponents a chance to let their money talk. If the bill became law, they'd be able to purchase strictly wind-generated power for their homes and businesses from their electric utility.

There's just one catch. [ Read more...]

2010 WATCH: Favorability ratings are down, but she'd still demolish what's-their-names

Poll shows Sebelius would dominate 2010 Senate race

Kansas's Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius has seen a significant decline in favorability ratings since she ran for re-election in 2006, but she remains sufficiently popular to defeat easily either U.S. Rep. Jerry Moran or U.S. Rep. Todd Tiahrt for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Sam Brownback, if she chose to run.

Results of a poll conducted by Research 2000 were published today on the Daily Kos, a liberal website that commissioned the poll.

Del Ali, president of Research 2000, told Kansas Liberty his company had been contracted by the Daily Kos to do periodic polling on U.S. Senate races through the 2010 election season. [ Read more...]

SMALL-TOWN NEWS: The fight is over legal notices, the lifeblood of many weeklies. Municipalities want to see more use of official websites. 'Government should not be in charge of publishing its own news.'

Local governments take aim at small-town newspapers

The Kansas Press Association and its members are ready to wage war against a Senate bill that would allow cities, counties, school districts and other taxing entities to print their legal notices on their websites, instead of in newspapers.

Local governments, many of which are struggling with declining revenues, claim they are seeking the change as a way to reduce expenditures and to better meet the needs of citizens who are migrating to the web for information.

But the cost may be the local newspapers that provide cities and towns with news they can't get elsewhere. [ Read more...]

STIMULUS: It's string theory: DC money usually comes with plenty of those attached. School Boards Association: 'We feel sometimes that the state or federal government makes too many decisions that might be better made at a local leve

Many Kansans worried a federal handout would come with too many conditions

With the U.S. House of Representative's version of a stimulus plan being debated in the Senate this week, many Kansas agencies are looking at how they would spend the federal assistance being discussed as part of the bill.

But lawmakers, state officials and policy experts are also fearful that the federal money would come with strings attached that might not result in the kind of handout many Kansans would find useful.

Still others are worried about how they could spend funds while staying within the federal government’s regulations on how the funding can be used. [ Read more...]

JOBS IN KANSAS: After 38 mass layoffs in one month, state jobless rate still behind national level

Kansas unemployment rate ends 2008 above 5 percent

According to the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics Report on unemployment, Kansas experienced yet another rise in unemployment for the month of December.

Kansas’ rate of unemployment rate increased from 4.9 percent in November 2008 to 5.2 percent in December 2008 and has increased 1 percent between December 2007 and December 2008. The national unemployment rate increased from 6.8 to 7.2 percent in December, and increased 2.3 percent within the last year.

Kansas also experienced 38 mass layoffs in December, which were 11 more mass layoffs than in December 2007. [ Read more...]

Look at a side-by-side comparison and some wonder, what makes the difference?

Why is Nebraska a low-employment oasis?

It's just an invisible line on a big, flat plain, but there's a big difference in the employment environment on either side of the Kansas-Nebraska border.

For example, during December, Kansas experienced 38 mass layoffs in December. Nebraska? Twelve. And though Kansas' 5.2 percent unemployment rate is lower than the national jobless rate, Nebraska's is only 4 percent.

Yet both states have roughly the same tax rates in most categories, including corporate and income tax rates, according to the Tax Foundation, and both are rated about the same by the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council. [ Read more...]

COMMENT: The nostalgia's nice, but, as Bill Sutton explains, the new ERA push is 'a money grab by NOW to pump more public money into the thriving abortion industry in Kansas.'

Kansas ERA: End-Run for Abortion?

Does anyone still remember 1977? That’s the year of "Smokey and the Bandit" and "Saturday Night Fever," disco, polyester shirts and feathered hair. The dulcet tones of Shaun Cassidy launching his brief teen-idol career by covering The Crystals (“Yeah, her name was Jill…”) blared from eight-track players everywhere. It was pretty much a dead-end of cultural evolution. What on earth is Muskrat Love, anyway? [ Read more...]

COMMENT: From federal handouts to taxes to Iraq, there's nothing but good news out there, according to that happy Main Street Money optimist, Bill Wyckoff. Want to feel the power of positive thinking? Hold onto your spark plugs and start your engines!

Smile! You're not dead! Yet.

One of the great things we have at our small community bank is the ability for the entire bank’s staff to challenge and discuss just about anything we do.

Call it open door, open line or just venting. As in any family unit, ideas are sometimes presented that don’t get action, but all are heard and considered.

I guess that lately my frustration with all the new government regulation, stimulus giveaways, TARP, son of TARP, and a bank exam that wrapped up minutes before Santa arrived on Christmas eve, has apparently put me in a crabby mood - at least that is what a senior vice president told me bluntly as she left on vacation for a Caribbean cruise. [ Read more...]

SNIDE COMMENTS: Locking up kids for cash | Kansas City Star botches (yet another) abortion story | Daschle may have saved the wheatbelt warriors

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