Topeka ? Legislators would be barred from closing their party caucus meetings under a measure sponsored by the House Ethics and Elections Committee.

The measure was prompted by this week’s gathering of Senate Republicans to discuss a bill to cut the state budget by $54 million. Reporters were asked to leave before senators were polled to see if a majority would support the measure, which was later abandoned.

Legislative caucuses are exempt from the Kansas Open Meetings Act. But House Republican caucuses are open, as are those conducted by Democrats in both the House and the Senate.

Rep. Nancy Kirk, D-Topeka, a member of the House Ethics panel, asked that the bill requiring open caucuses be drafted. She said Wednesday that closing such meetings was “unconscionable.”

“We expect all units of government to abide by the open meetings rule, and we exempt ourselves,” Kirk said.

Kirk’s initiative is backed by the House Ethics panel’s Republican chairman, Tony Powell of Wichita.

“We ought to have open government,” Powell said. “I’m not much for secret polls.”

The Senate’s Republicans said they didn’t see the problem.

“If we want to close a caucus every once in a while, I think it is perfectly all right,” said Senate President Dave Kerr, R-Hutchinson.

Senate Majority Leader Lana Oleen, R-Manhattan, said lawmakers sometimes need to be able to speak without fear of being quoted. She said she recalled few closed caucuses during her years in the Legislature.

But Kirk noted that Republicans hold majorities in both chambers.

“So they can actually conduct business which is what they in fact were doing the other day behind closed doors,” she said.