Kansas views on school funding, tax cuts, sex ed, closed meeting, body cam footage
School funding – School districts should be working on next year’s budgets and employee agreements. Instead they are waiting to see how the Legislature will respond to a Kansas Supreme Court order that found the state was not funding its districts equitably. At least one proposed remedy would take money from wealthier school districts and give it to poorer districts. But that is kicking the can down the road.
Tax cuts – How the governor has maintained such steadfast opposition to revisiting the unsustainable tax cuts has been a mystery, given the number of missed revenue forecasts, raids and sweeps of funds from highway and children’s programs, credit downgrades, cuts in funding to universities and public schools, delayed payments, IOUs and borrowed money to pay current bills.
Sex ed – The state of Kansas is in financial turmoil, and even the conservative voters have lost confidence in our governor. The Legislature can’t figure out how to pay for schools, and they fight to pass laws that will hold up constitutional muster. So what do our lawmakers do next? They attempt to control how teenagers learn about sex, of course. Best we can figure, this is one area of our state that doesn’t need fixing.
Closed meeting – Leave it to Kansas lawmakers to disregard openness during Sunshine Week, a time set aside to encourage transparency in government. We saw as much March 14, when reporters were ejected as tempers flared during a Senate GOP caucus meeting. In driving reporters away, Senate President Susan Wagle, R-Wichita, said, “People can open up when the press isn’t there.” Therein lies the problem.
Body camera footage – A bill passed out of the House Judiciary Committee would automatically designate police body camera footage as “investigative records,” which would put them beyond the scope of the Kansas Open Records Act and essentially require a lawsuit for the public – or the media – to see. This is ridiculous. Body cams help police by making it difficult for criminals to accuse them of abusing their badge. Body cams also help deter bad cops from abusing their badges. Making that footage more difficult to obtain helps no one.
This story was originally published March 20, 2016 at 7:06 PM with the headline "Kansas views on school funding, tax cuts, sex ed, closed meeting, body cam footage."