Here’s a press release from AFP — Kansas announcing that organization’s legislative agenda for Kansas. I’ll be reporting more about this after a meeting with AFP representatives tomorrow.
TOPEKA — The free-market grassroots group Americans for Prosperity — Kansas today announced its priorities for the 2009 legislative session.
“Our legislative agenda this year focuses on ways to make our state government more accountable to its people,” said AFP-Kansas state director Derrick Sontag. “We support real and meaningful reforms of how our state manages its finances, how we select our judges, and how we track taxpayer-funded lobbyists.”
Sontag said years of over spending at the state level have now come to a head, with a mounting budget deficit looming.
“The state of our budget cannot be blamed solely on the current economy,” said Sontag. “It’s quite simple: we have an over spending problem in our state government.”
Sontag said that had our state budget grown at a more moderate rate, the state’s financial situation would be vastly different today.
“Had the Legislature approved budgets with five percent growth since 2004, rather than eight or nine percent growth, the state would have more than $2 billion in the bank,” he said.
AFP plans to help legislators fight the temptation to raise taxes in order to balance the budget, encouraging them to make responsible cuts and to implement budget reform.
“Our state is one of the few nationwide with no budget stabilization fund,” Sontag said. “We must do what we can to build up reserves so our state can weather tough financial times without asking taxpayers to shoulder the burden.”
AFP’s full legislative agenda is available at www.americansforprosperity.org/kansas.
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