Kansas Senate panel advances Brownback’s cabinet picks

A Kansas Senate panel voted to recommend three of Gov. Sam Brownback’s picks for cabinet secretaries Tuesday.

The Senate Confirmation Oversight Committee voted 5-1 to approve Brownback’s pick for Transportation secretary, Richard Carlson, a former lawmaker who served 10 years in the Kansas House.

Carlson’s appointment faced scrutiny from Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, D-Topeka, the committee’s sole Democrat.

Hensley pointed to Carlson’s role in passing income tax cuts in 2012, which many analysts have blamed for the state’s budget problems. Carlson was chairman of the House Taxation Committee during that session and was one of the leading proponents for the tax plan.

“I can’t in good conscience … support this confirmation when Mr. Carlson really led the effort in the House to pass a plan that has basically decimated the Department of Transportation and the highway fund,” Hensley said.

Republicans on the committee pushed back against this criticism. Senate Vice President Jeff King, R-Independence, said Carlson, a former Pottawatomie County commissioner and banker, has the experience to lead the agency through difficult times.

Brownback has repeatedly moved money from the state’s highway fund to address budget shortfalls, which has led to the cancellation of road projects. Carlson dismissed the connection between those moves and the tax plan he helped passed.

“I don’t see any connection,” Carlson told reporters after the hearing. “On tax policy or the budget, you can make connections between dots that don’t exist.”

He noted that highway fund sweeps have “been done by governors of both parties over the years.”

KDOT has indefinitely delayed 24 road projects, which were set to go up for bid this month, amid uncertainty about funding. Carlson said the agency did not have a timeline for when those projects would go up for bid.

“We have a number of really good, sharp, young people that are dealing with the cash flows month by month by month at KDOT,” Carlson said. “And so that becomes a very meticulous job. It becomes a very difficult job at times.”

The committee voted unanimously to recommend the confirmation of Tim Keck as secretary of Aging and Disability. Keck, a Topeka attorney, has overseen KDADS since January and has headed up the effort to restore Osawatomie State Hospital’s Medicare certification.

The hospital lost its certification the month before Keck stepped up as interim secretary. The lost certification costs the state about $1 million in federal aid each month.

The committee also voted unanimously to approve Joseph Norwood as secretary of Corrections. Norwood, a native of Leavenworth, has more than three decades of experience in the federal prison system, most recently serving as Northeast regional director for the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

The nominations will go before the whole Senate for a confirmation vote after the Legislature convenes its 2017 session next month.

This story was originally published December 13, 2016 at 12:41 PM with the headline "Kansas Senate panel advances Brownback’s cabinet picks."