The Flint Hills Center for Public Policy, a Kansas-based think tank, recently changed its name to the Kansas Policy Institute. Now the organization’s website, formerly at www.flinthills.org, has changed. The new site is Kansas Policy Institute at www.kansaspolicy.org.
From the new site: Kansas Policy Institute is an independent non-profit organization that advocates for free enterprise solutions and the protection of personal freedom. Our work is focused on state and local economic issues in Kansas with particular emphasis on education, fiscal policy and health care. We empower citizens and legislators with credible research and creative ideas to promote a low-tax, pro-growth environment that preserves the ability to provide high quality services.
Recently the Kansas Policy Institute (formerly known as the Flint Hills Center for Public Policy) released “A Kansas Primer on Education Funding.” This is a four-volume set of research, with volumes one and two available at present.
Topeka, Kan., Dec. 9 – KansasReporter is pleased to announce the December 9 launch of its state capital news bureau.
KansasReporter is an online news service providing original reporting on Kansas government. The state capital bureau in Topeka is staffed by two full-time, experienced journalists. Their work will be published online at and accessible for everyone to read. It is also available as a free “wire service” to all media outlets.
KansasReporter is a project of Kansas Policy Institute. KPI President Dave Trabert says, “We launched this service to help fill a void created by the unfortunate reduction in media resources devoted to state government news coverage. The closing of Harris News Service’s Topeka bureau earlier this year and other cutbacks have reduced information available to citizens and media outlets outside the Topeka area at a critical time. The mission is to ensure that government is held accountable to all Kansans and to examine issues from all sides. We recognize that being founded by a public policy organization raises legitimate questions of balance. The purpose of KansasReporter is not to promote a particular viewpoint but to provide vigorous and credible reporting on all sides of stories. We encourage readers to hold us accountable to our mission and welcome their constructive criticism.”
Brian R. Hook leads the coverage as bureau chief. He will oversee editing and also report on a daily basis. With more than 15 years of journalism experience, he worked as a freelance journalist for the last ten years. He reported for dozens of publishers, including Financial Times, Dow Jones, McGraw-Hill, Kiplinger’s and U.S. News & World Report. He started his career in TV news at KAKE-TV in Wichita, before moving to Oklahoma City and then to St. Louis, helping to launch a new, prime-time newscast at KTVI.
Gene Meyer is the new reporter for KansasReporter.org. Meyer spent 25 years reporting for the Kansas City Star. While at the Star he reported and co-wrote a series of stories regarding Kansas pension fund investment practices that led to enactment of state legislation to increase safeguards for public employees’ retirement savings. In addition to reporting for a commodity news service out of Leawood, Kan., Meyer worked for the Wall Street Journal from its Chicago bureau covering agricultural futures markets for the newspapers and Dow Jones News Wire.
Kansas Policy Institute
Kansas Policy Institute is a non-profit organization that advocates for free enterprise solutions and the protection of personal freedom. It also operates KansasWatchdog, KansasOpenGov and KansasVotes.
Contact information for KansasReporter is Brian R. Hook, Bureau Chief
Topeka Office: 785.408.6100
Email: brhook@kansaspolicy.org
Continuing a debate on Kansas school funding on the KPTS television public affairs program Kansas Week, Kansas Policy Institute (formerly the Flint Hills Center for Public Policy) President Dave Trabert appeared tonight to present KPI’s findings about school funding. While school spending advocates have criticized these findings, there’s really good news for Kansas in the numbers.
Trabert said that despite the large amount of discussion about school funding in recent years, there is still much misunderstanding about the topic.
He said that KPI put out a report that showed that Kansas schools finished the last fiscal year with $1.5 billion in unencumbered cash. A portion of it is not available for general use, he said, but $699.2 million is. This is not only according to KPI’s analysis, Trabert said. Dale Dennis, Kansas Deputy Commissioner of Education, last week told Kansas State Education board members how schools could access these funds. Money flows in to the general or supplemental general fund, and is then disbursed to other special funds. Money in the special funds can be used only for the fund’s stated purpose, but by reducing contributions to these funds, schools can effectively access the money in these funds.
An an example, Trabert used a food service fund with a balance of $10 million. Then suppose a district believes it will need to spend $15 million on food service. Instead of stocking the fund with $15 million of new funding, add just $5 million (plus a little more). This gives the food service fund the ability to do its job, but it frees up perhaps $10 million to be used for other purposes.
Trabert said that Dennis agrees that this action is possible.
The $699.2 million balance in the operating category is a 53% increase over the past four years. “The only way that those balances grow is when more money goes in to them than is taken out,” Trabert said. This means that schools didn’t need all the revenue they received.
Host Tim Brown noted that there is a fierce debate over this, with schools saying this money isn’t available for spending in this way. Specifically, ending balances in funds are needed for expenses during a “carry over” period from July 1 to October 25. Trabert said yes, schools need something for this period, but no one knows how much. The fact that the balances are growing rapidly is strong evidence that the balances are higher than needed.
A second area of misunderstanding concerns how much the state is spending on schools. Using Kansas State Department of Education figures, Trabert showed that spending has been growing rapidly over the past years. Further, state spending is just part of local school districts’ total spending. For example, for the 2008-2009 school year, spending by the state of Kansas was $3,287.2 million, while Kansas school districts spent $5,666.7 million.
Often only the Kansas base state aid per pupil is focused on, but that number is just the starting point for school spending. While this number has been cut, total spending by schools fell by only 0.64% last year, Trabert said.
Brown said that these numbers are different from numbers seen in some other sources. Trabert replied that the numbers he is using are from the Kansas State Department of Education. Often school spending advocates use numbers that represent just a portion of the total school spending picture.
In conclusion, Trabert said that there is really some good news in these figures: “We don’t have to have higher taxes or cut services. We can have both if we figure out how to make better use of all the money we already have.”
(Kansas Liberty) Special treatment and favors pollute health care reform bill: “Senate Democrats have worked in extra provisions to the reform plans that would give their states special advantages, including financial assistance with Medicaid costs, additional Medicare benefits and extra tax breaks for some residents. Republicans point out that these advantages will shift some of the costs of the plan to other states, including Kansas. Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, has been instrumental in adding in extra benefits for himself and for his Democratic colleagues.”
(Kansas Liberty) Last week’s meeting centered on discussing possible ways to make additional cuts, and many conservative Republicans are continuing to look at K-12 as a way to decrease state spending. The committee also discussed the possibility of school consolidation to save funds, identifying state agencies that could possibly be scaled back or eliminated, and possibilities for spurring job growth within the state as a way to increase revenues. … Democrats had already started planting the idea that tax increases are necessary.
(Kansas Watchdog) “The Flint Hills Center for Public Policy has changed its name to the Kansas Policy Institute. The non-profit, non-partisan organization will continue to pursue the same free market interests under the new name.”
(Kansas Watchdog) “Educators say K-12 schools need $70 million more in 2010. And the state is expecting a budget shortfall of $500 million or more in 2010 — even without factoring in requests for more spending. One way to help fix the problem might be more honest reporting on the nature of the state’s budgetary woes.”
(Kansas Watchdog) “Labette Community College president George Knox donated $500 to the campaign of State Treasurer Dennis McKinney according to a report by KOAM TV. A donation to a political candidate by a private citizen is not unusual, but KOAM TV reported that LCC trustee Mike Howerter questioned the reimbursement claim for the political donation by the college president.”
State of the State Kansas takes a look at health insurance this week, featuring video interviews with Kansas Senator Jim Barnett, Kansas Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger, Mary Beth Chambers from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas, and others.