Topeka ? In a legislative session devoted to cutting budgets for public schools and higher education and keeping Kansans with disabilities on waiting lists, Democrats expressed dismay when Republicans successfully pushed for tax cuts last week.

And several Democrats expressed concern with one area that the tax cuts would go toward — a sales tax exemption for the sale of game birds used in hunting, and fees and charges for participation in guided and nonguided hunts and fishing excursions.

“We can’t continue to pass tax exemptions,” state Sen. Marci Francisco, D-Lawrence, said.

But state Rep. Anthony Brown, R-Eudora, said the tax cut is more complicated than it appears.

He said the hunting and fishing services were never deemed taxable until recently and that’s what prompted the legislation.

“It has been a longstanding tradition that we don’t tax services,” Brown said.

The Kansas Department of Revenue issued a notice in 2007 that the sales taxes were due, but in 2008 the department said it was reviewing its interpretation.

The exemption is part of larger tax-cutting bill sent Friday to Gov. Kathleen Sebelius.

According to the legislative brief on House Bill 2172, other provisions include:

• Repealing the sunset of an existing sales tax exemption for cash rebates on new vehicle purchases.

• Exempting from sales taxes some purchases made for Goodwill Industries, Easter Seals, Sheltered Living and the Kansas Fairgrounds Foundation.

• Exempting from sales taxes purchases made for All American Beef Battalion Inc. for projects that provide support to the military;

• Expanding the Homestead Property Tax Refund Program to include disabled veterans and surviving spouses of military personnel who died in the line of duty.

Some legislators who voted for the bill said they didn’t like certain parts of it, but supported the provisions aimed at charities, military personnel and the continuation of the vehicle rebate break.

If the bill is enacted into law, the measure will reduce taxes to the state by $4.5 million in the next fiscal year, according to state officials. The provision that would affect bird sales and fishing and hunting would cost the treasury $500,000 per year, state officials said. But supporters of the bill say that fiscal note has been exaggerated.