Star-Journbal Editor
Kansas Sen. Jim Barnett and Rep. Don Dahl were at the Hillsboro City Building a half hour early for the annual legislative coffee Saturday morning, eager to update local citizens about the latest goings-on in the state capitol, answer burning questions from the public, and ask a few pointed questions of their own.
When the forum began at 8:30 a.m., discussion topics ranged from out-of-control state spending, to carbon-spewing coal-fired power plants, to stopping felons from getting licenses to sell real estate. The two highest-ranking state officials in the area seemed to enjoy the civil give and take of ideas with everyone in attendance — all 16 of them.
Sixteen people?
"It's typical," said Christy Wulf, director of the Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce, which sponsored the event. "People complain about what's going on in Topeka but don't show up to have their voices heard. But this is about the number we usually get for these legislative coffees."
Undaunted by all the empty chairs, Rep. Dahl began the forum with an update on the fiscal state of affairs in Topeka, which has become a "very serious problem," he said, adding that the state's debt, the growth of government; the lack of growth in personal income, and the lack of growth in private sec-r jobs, all are matters of concern.
"The thing is, what are we going to do about the situation?" he asked, rhetorically. "There's basically two areas of thought. One area is to raise taxes to pay for different things; and the other philosophy is to reduce taxes. Well, I happen to be one of the individuals who thinks economic development can be driven by reducing taxes. Putting more money back in individuals' pockets, and also in the pockets of businessmen."
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The rancorous debate on the state budget came to a vote on the house floor last week, on a day that Dahl referred to as a "postcard day."
"There was a whole bunch of us representatives up there trying to hold the line on the budget, which is just skyrocketing out of control," Dahl said.
He picked up a stack of stapled papers, and began to rifle through them.
"I can show you pages here of amendment after amendment that have been offered on people's pet projects or people's ideas of where they want to spend more money," he said. "To hold the line on the budget you have to vote against these very good programs. Most of these are programs that I love and I agree with. But they want to put more money in there; another $2 million here, or another $5 million there. What happens after 39 amendments are offered is 39 times $5 million, which is what people say gets to be real money.
"So a whole bunch of people in the House decided that we were going to vote no on all of these; to draw a line in the sand and say no, we're stopping, we're not going to vote for these. Well, like I say, it's a postcard day, because our opponents [send out postcards to voters that] say, 'Dahl voted against this and Dahl voted against this and Dahl voted against this.'
"But that's what's gotten out of control in Topeka."
Dahl, who presided last week as speaker pro-tem of the House, said he grew increasingly frustrated by the proceedings.
"I was sitting in the chair the whole time running the show this last week, and I had to sit there when people got up there and talked. Once you're up in the chair you can't say, 'Wait a minute, I'd like to come down and speak to this bill.' No, you're stuck there. But when I heard people come up there and talk about 'You're giving all these tax breaks to business! What are you giving to the worker?'
"I felt like saying [he smacked his hands together] 'We're giving them jobs! With benefits! What don't you understand people?'"
There was a trickle of nervous laughter among the 16 startled attendees.
"The problem is we're driving businesses out of the state," he added. "Taxes drive businesses out. You raise taxes and you aren't going to have businesses coming in. They don't come to a high tax place. And so this is the frustration we feel."
The recent vote to eliminate franchise taxes on businesses over the next three years is a step in the right direction, he said, but added that the tax relief came too late to help keep major employers such as Pay-Less Shoes and its 400 jobs from leaving the state. The Menninger Clinic and Pizza Hut also have left Kansas, he added.
"What are we doing here? Does anybody understand? Does anybody get the picture? We're driving them out of the state."
But, in a victory for senior citizens, Dahl said the House had passed a bill that says Social Security recipients no longer will to pay state taxes on their receipts.
"It's already been taxed once already, so why should you be taxed again?"
After about 30 minutes of high-powered rhetoric, Dahl yielded the tile floor to Sen. Barnett, a soft-spoken physician from Emporia, who was the Republican candidate for governor in the last election.
"I think Representative Dahl's comments and concerns about the economy are very real," Barnett said, before paying the town a compliment. "I drove into Hillsboro today and sort of cruised up and down your Main Street. It's a lovely downtown you have. I know you've put a lot of work into what you're accomplishing in Hillsboro, not that your challenges are all met. But congratulations for all the good things that you've accomplished."
Barnett said Dahl was on target when he said tax incentives also were critical to the future.
"Businesses do make a choice of either coming to Kansas or going to another state," he said. "How we can remain competitive from the standpoint of our tax base is critically important.
"From a state standpoint, for us to control our taxes, we have to control our spending," he added. "The budget the governor proposed grows at about 7.7 percent, and if you follow the rate of inflation, the CPI [consumer price index] is 2.1 percent. So the budget is between three and four times the rate of inflation. It's this way over and over again. We can't keep that up, we can't sustain it. So we do need fiscal restraint in Topeka, just like we need it at home and in our businesses."
Barnett, who is chairman of the Senate Health and Welfare Committee, said another point of emphasis for him was trying to find a solution for the 300,000 Kansans with no health insurance.
"One of the interesting policy questions is should we require all people to be insured?" he said. "I'm not going to say what the answer is to that, but it is still open to debate."
More than half of the 300,000 uninsured are between the age of 18 and 34 years-old, Barnett said, adding that most of them lose their health insurance benefits when they change jobs.
"For those of you who have car insurance, who owns the policy? Do you own the policy, or does your employer own it? The answer is of course that you own your car policy. For those of you who own homes, who owns your homeowner's insurance? You do.
"So if you change jobs, you don't lose your car insurance and you don't lose home owner's insurance, but we have a system in America for health insurance coverage that probably no one in their right mind would create now, if we had a choice. Because when you change jobs, you all of a sudden become uninsured. One of the things we're looking at is if we should change the ownership of health insurance to the individual, so you'd have portability."
Barnett said his goal was to position Kansas as a national leader in health care reform, so that Kansans would be first in line to get federal assistance in a public, private enterprise.
"I don't think expanding government's role is the answer to this, personally," he said. "But I'm trying to find something that will work [in the private sector]."
Barnett also talked about the senate's passage of a bill raising the eligibility age for young people to obtain a driver's license by about a year, with added restrictions for teen-age drivers, including no talking on cell phones while driving.
"One of the reasons kids have accidents that are fatal," he added, "is that you get a car full of kids and the accident rate and the death rate go up exponentially. We limited it to one non-sibling teenage passenger in the car. I'm not sure what the House will do with the bill, but there is some time for discussion on this as well."
Befitting her status as first lady of Hillsboro, Mayor Delores Dalke was the first to be recognized during the question and answer portion of the program. She thanked and congratulated the legislators; for Dahl rising to speaker pro-tem; and for Barnett making a run for governor.
Dalke, a Realtor, asked the legislators to vote in favor of a bill that would prohibit felons from receiving state real estate licenses.
"Because right now, the real estate commission is allowing eight to 10 felons a month to be licensed to sell real estate," Dalke said. "You might wonder, 'Well, so?' But you know what? Your house is in MLS [multiple listing service]. There's a lock box on it, which means those people can open your house up and go in there and check things out. And we're terribly opposed to that and want to see that stopped."
Another citizen asked legislators to think twice before allowing coal-burning power plants with high carbon-monoxide pollution to be built in the state. Both Barnett and Dahl agreed that wind power made sense in the land of the south wind.
After a few more questions, the legislators shook hands and departed for Marion, where another legislator's coffee was scheduled at 11 o'clock.
There was so much coffee cake left over that Wulf begged the 16 citizens to take an extra piece or two home with them.
"This is about as many as we get for these legislative coffees," Wulf said. "We give the community the opportunity to come out and talk with their elected state officials, to meet the people they voted into office, which 90 percent of them have never done.
"This is the fourth one I've been to, and I was hoping there'd be more interest this time," she added. "We'll do it again next year."
