The Docking State Office Building is emblematic of the problems plaguing state government.

The 12-story, 500,000-square-foot building is nearly empty. State agencies have fled the building for private lease space at rates that are 20 percent lower than the state’s lease rates.

Gov. Sam Brownback and lawmakers are at odds over what to do with the building, built in the 1950s. Brownback wants to demolish Docking, arguing that it is too old and obsolete and that the cost of renovating it to modern standards would be too high. The governor tried unsuccessfully to make that happen earlier this year and now sounds perfectly content to lay the blame for the building at the feet of the Legislature.

“We put forward a plan this last year and the Legislature didn’t want to do that, so we don’t have a plan that we’ve laid out,” Brownback said last week. “We don’t have one at this point in time.”

Kansas lawmakers have opposed demolition as too costly, especially since it includes relocating the “power plant” that controls heating and air conditioning for the Statehouse and all the buildings in the Capitol Area Complex.

For the last several years, the Docking Building was occupied mainly by two of the largest state agencies: the Department of Revenue and the Department for Children and Families, formerly known as Social and Rehabilitation Services. Some lawmakers — including state Sen. Marci Francisco, D-Lawrence — believe Docking should be renovated and put back into use by the state.

Last week, the state’s Alcoholic Beverage Control office left Docking for another building a few blocks away. That means the only tenants left in Docking are a small unit of the Kansas Highway Patrol, which operates security for the building, some maintenance staff that operates and maintains the power plant, and a few smaller divisions of the Department of Revenue, including the revenue secretary’s office. The Revenue Department offices are expected to leave Docking in the coming months. Every time a tenant leaves the Docking Building, it costs the state a little bit more.

Next week, the Legislature’s Joint Committee on State Buildings and Construction meets to review five-year capital improvement plans. One can only hope the Docking Building is on the agenda. The governor and the Legislature owe it to taxpayers to come up with a plan for this growing albatross.