Give state civil service workers larger pay bump, lawmaker says

State workers who are part of the Kansas civil service system would receive a 6.5 percent raise while other employees would get a 1.5 percent raise under a proposal before the Senate’s budget panel.

The Senate Ways and Means Committee is considering a request from Sen. Laura Kelly, D-Topeka, to change a 2 percent pay raise for state workers that the committee voted on Monday to add to the state budget.

Kelly said the plan wouldn’t require additional spending above the $22 million next year from the state general fund needed to fund the 2 percent increase.

State workers haven’t received a raise in nearly a decade. But workers with civil service protections, called classified employees, who have given up those protections and become unclassified workers have often received raises when making the switch.

Classified workers can only be fired with cause, while unclassified employees can be fired at any time for any reason.

“Anybody in a classified position has not gotten a pay raise since fiscal year (2008). So that’s why we’ve put a disproportionate amount for them into this proposal,” Kelly said. “Because folks who are unclassified, many – if not all of them – have gotten raises the last few years.”

The number of classified workers has dropped over the past few years. A 2015 law allows state agencies to provide incentives to workers to become unclassified.

Illustrating the effect the law had on state agencies, in the months after the law was passed, the Kansas Corporation Commission said 76 of its 94 classified employees had agreed to become unclassified in exchange for a 7.5 percent pay increase.

Sen. Rick Billinger, R-Goodland, voiced concerns that Kelly’s proposal may be picking winners and losers among state workers. The state also doesn’t have the money for additional spending, he said.

“I don’t disagree that our state employees need raises,” Billinger said. “I’d be the first one to stand up and say we need to do this.

“But … to me, it’s a little premature to be trying to do this in ’18.”

The Ways and Means Committee will likely take action on the pay increase proposal on Wednesday. Sen. Carolyn McGinn, R-Sedgwick, who chairs the committee, said the panel will probably take action on an overall budget bill that day, too.

The budget legislation will set spending levels for the next two fiscal years. The 2018 fiscal year begins in July.

Senate Majority Leader Jim Denning, R-Overland Park, said he expects the Senate will debate the bill next week.

In its current form, the budget bill would leave the state with a $552 million budget deficit over the next two years. But lawmakers plan to pass a tax package to raise additional revenue.

Gov. Sam Brownback vetoed a bill earlier this year that would have raised personal income tax rates, re-instated a third bracket and once again taxed pass-through business income. The Legislature failed to override his veto.

This story was originally published March 21, 2017 at 4:31 PM with the headline "Give state civil service workers larger pay bump, lawmaker says."