Editor’s Note: The following is a report by state Rep. Paul Davis, D-Lawrence, on recent action in the Kansas Legislature. Davis was appointed to the Kansas House District 46 seat when former state Rep. Troy Findley left the position to serve as legislative liaison for Gov. Kathleen Sebelius. Davis’ column will be published online throughout the 2003 session of the Legislature.

This was a short week at the Legislature. As I mentioned in my last column, last week was “turnaround week” where all bills introduced in a chamber must be passed out of that particular chamber or they die. Consequently, the Legislature was very busy acting on dozens of bills last week. After this, the Legislature was in recess on Monday and Tuesday and returned to work on Wednesday. Turnaround week typically marks the halfway point of the session, so we’re now moving towards adjournment in early May. However, there is a significant amount of work that remains to be done.

The second half of the session will be dominated by budget discussions. As I write this column, I am awaiting some budget projections that will come from the governor’s office today (Friday). The state traditionally issues budget projections in both November and April. Last year, Governor Graves asked that the April projection be moved up to March to give the Legislature better numbers to work with as they put together a budget. Right now, the April projections will arrive after a great deal of work has already been done on the budget. Governor Sebelius has also asked that the budget projections be moved up to March (however, she still wants the April study to occur). However, the Speaker of the House and President of the Senate have not agreed to this (they have representatives on the state budget Consensus Estimating Group). But Governor Sebelius has asked her representative on the Consensus Estimating Group to go ahead and make the projections without the legislative representatives.

If the budget projections come in worse than expected, it is likely that the talk of a tax increase will pick up. The budget is so fragile that if revenues drop much further, it will be almost impossible to avoid cuts in education and social services. The dilemma then becomes, who will take the lead on advocating for a tax increase? There are a number of moderate Republicans that are prepared to support a tax increase to spare education from further cuts, but they would like to see Governor Sebelius take the lead. Right now, the governor has shied away from advocating for a tax increase, but it will be interesting to see if she will continue to do so if the budget projections change.

Next week may be a contentious week in the House of Representatives because an abortion bill will be debated and voted on. The bill proposes to enact special regulatory standards for abortion clinics. Physicians that perform abortions are already regulated by the Board of Healing Arts and many clinics that perform abortions are regulated by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment as “ambulatory surgical centers.” However, anti-abortion legislators believe separate regulations should be put in place for these clinics and physicians. It is likely that amendments may be offered to the bill. The debate over this issue will of course be controversial and may have a polarizing effect on the chamber. It seems as though the House leadership has tried to keep the debate of controversial social issues away from the House floor so that legislators can keep focused on the budget issues, but this may be unavoidable next week.

I commend the House leadership for trying to focus on the budget because the challenges are very large. I took advantage of having Monday and Tuesday off to do a lot of outreach in my district and visited several senior centers, an elementary school and a social service agency. They are all being affected by the state’s fiscal situation. Perhaps the most profound example was a woman who lived at Babcock Place that lost her SRS assistance that paid for her hearing aid batteries. She lives on nothing but social security so she desperately needs the SRS assistance. Furthermore, she can’t hear at all without her hearing aid and is consequently being forced to make decisions about whether to eat or hear. These situations are absolutely horrible and must be rectified by the State. We have to take care of our most vulnerable citizens. I hope the Legislature can find the revenue to make sure that we don’t leave people like the woman at Babcock Place shut out from basic needs.