While many other states are looking at ways to boost research funding and attract new federal grant money, Kansas officials are bickering about how to cover heating bills at the state's universities. Instead of working to hire top scientists and researchers, state officials are focused on how to handle a mandated pay raise for state universities' lowest-paid employees.
It's this kind of tunnel vision that could keep Kansas shackled to the past instead of moving forward into a prosperous future.
U.S. Rep. Pat Roberts, R-Kan, visited Topeka Monday to reiterate his support for the state funding that could be used to help the state attract more federal grants for medical and high-technology research. He told state legislators that Kansas is handicapped in the competition for those grants because its aging research infrastructure isn't keeping up with other states.
The solution, he said, is funding to help build research facilities that will make Kansas more competitive in the race for grants. Roberts is particularly interested in building a nationally recognized center for life sciences research in Kansas City. Kansas University Medical Center is a key component to that plan.
This is an idea that calls for vision and decisive action. And what is the response from officials in Topeka?
Senate President Dave Kerr, R-Hutchinson, said the state could issue bonds to build laboratories and science buildings, but, of course, before we do that we would have to have some specific requests from the life sciences initiative. Although no one from Gov. Graves' office attended the meeting with Roberts, a representative said the governor had discussed this issue with the senator before and although medical research is "a worthy goal, there is a long line of worthy goals."
Such rousing support isn't likely to put Kansas at the forefront of life sciences research or anything else.
Commenting on Roberts' remarks, Kansas Sen. Sandy Praeger, R-Lawrence, noted the need to "elevate the debate in terms of being proactive." Proactive is a word that hardly seems to be in the vocabulary of Kansas state government which is almost solely focused on being reactive to short-term goals and problems. Rather than looking ahead with a vision for higher education or high-technology enterprises that could provide jobs and feed the state economy, the governor and state legislators are picking around the edges of the budget trying to put a higher tax on cigarettes or expand state-sponsored gambling to fulfill the basic needs of state universities.
The president of the Stowers Institute for Medical Research, which would be a key part of the biosciences hub in Kansas City, said Monday that a state commitment of $30 million a year would reap substantial benefits for the state of Kansas. It's not too much to spend to keep Kansas in the race for research grants. Will state officials be able to see the need to make such proactive investments in the future now rather than reacting later after Kansas has been left behind?
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