Brownback says budget will ‘balance at the end’ as lawmakers prepare for votes

Kansas lawmakers are set to vote on bills this week that depend on tax increases to balance the budget, no easy feat to pass in the conservative-leaning Legislature.

But Gov. Sam Brownback showed little worry when pressed by reporters about that.

“You’re required to in the Constitution to balance your budget every year. It will happen,” he said.

The Legislature faces a projected $600 million shortfall for the 2016 fiscal year, which starts in July.

“We’re working with everybody every day on that. It will balance at the end,” Brownback said. “I’m pushing that it not only balance but that it have a healthy ending balance.”

The budget bill expected to be up for a vote in the Kansas House this week is projected to close that shortfall and leave the state with a $78 million positive ending balance at the end of 2016. That would be a 1.2 percent ending balance – below the 7.5 percent ending balance recommended by Kansas statute.

That figure – included in documents circulated to lawmakers – comes with some major caveats. First, the state is about $38 million off pace in revenue projections for the year, so the ending balance would probably be closer to $40 million at this point, even if the state hits estimates every month from now through June 2016.

Brownback acknowledged that low oil prices had an impact on tax revenue and that sales and income tax revenue has been volatile.

“You get variables, and income tax is really gyrating a lot. So that’s why I’m pushing for let’s get a healthier ending balance,” he said. “But it’s going to pull together.

“You’re at the tough time of the session where people have got to figure out how you’re going to make ends meet.”

The budget figures also assume that lawmakers pass the more than $200 million tax increases the governor proposed in January, including slowing down scheduled income tax cuts and raising “sin” taxes on alcohol and tobacco.

But elements of the governor’s tax proposal – the tax increases on alcohol and tobacco in particular – have gained little traction in the Legislature. House Speaker Ray Merrick, R-Stilwell, voiced his opposition in February, and many political observers say the sin tax hike is unlikely to pass.

The Legislature has been slow to move forward with any tax increases this session. Many Republican lawmakers say they need to figure out how much they’re going to spend before they start planning to increase taxes.

Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, D-Topeka, said last week that this strategy is ill-advised.

“They’re definitely doing it backwards. What you should do first is determine how much revenue you have before you craft a budget,” Hensley said. “They’re doing it this way because it’s easy to vote for a budget. It’s much more difficult to vote for a revenue package.”

Brownback, on the other hand, chalked this up to the legislative process. He said he had offered a plan to balance the budget, but others were also offering ideas and he looked forward to seeing what makes it through the Legislature in the end.

“Right now you’re in the season of people throwing out a hundred different ideas,” Brownback said. “I mean, you could go over there right now and you’d have 200 different ideas. That’s good. It’s just, at some point, you’ve got to have some coalescing behind enough of an idea.”

This story was originally published March 24, 2015 at 6:40 AM with the headline "Brownback says budget will ‘balance at the end’ as lawmakers prepare for votes."