Voice For Liberty

Tag: Kansas state government

Articles about Kansas, its government, and public policy in Kansas.

  • Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius, opponent of liberty

    According to “Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors: 2006” recently released by The Cato Institute, Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius earns a grade of “D.”

    How did she fare so poorly? According to the report: “Governors who have cut taxes and spending the most receive the highest grades. Those who have increased spending and taxes the most receive the lowest grades.” What is unusual and good about this report is that it considers what governors recommended, as well as what actually happened.

    This is important. Governor Sebelius takes credit for having no increases in taxes during her term. That’s not for trying, though. Her proposed tax increases were rejected by the legislature. The Cato study, however, sees through that, and grades her accordingly.

    Why are low taxes important? From the study:

    This report card emphasizes the importance of tax cuts in general because the evidence shows that states that reduce taxes improve their prospects for economic growth. For example, a 1996 study by Zsolt Besci of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta found that “relative marginal tax rates have a statistically significant negative relationship with relative state growth averaged for the period from 1961 to 1992.” The message of the study for state governments is that “lowering aggregate state and local marginal tax rates is likely to have a positive effect on longterm growth rates.” A study for the congressional Joint Economic Committee by Richard Vedder of Ohio University came to a similar conclusion. A study by Thomas Dye of Florida State University found that states with no income tax had higher personal income growth (and smaller government growth) than states that had an income tax.

    Tax changes enacted in the states offer a useful laboratory for exploring the effects of tax policy. A comparison of the economic performance of the 10 states that increased taxes the most with the economic performance of the 10 states that cut taxes the most during 1990–2005 suggests that when states reduce taxes they improve their relative economic performance.

    Kansas, as has been noted, has a relatively high tax burden, and had our governor had her way, our taxes would be higher now. If re-elected, there is no reason to believe her appetite for more tax revenue would be diminished. As poor as our economic growth and job growth has been recently, it would undoubtedly have been worse had our governor been able to pass the tax increases she proposed.

    But there’s something even more important than economic growth and jobs at stake. Collecting more tax revenue and spending more means Kansas government is getting larger, and that’s been happening even though there has not been a tax increase. Large and powerful governments, be they local or national, are the opposite of liberty and freedom. That’s why Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius, with her only partially unfulfilled goal of higher taxes and larger government, is an opponent of liberty.

  • Personal income up in Kansas, but …

    As reported in the Lawrence Journal-World on September 27, 2006, personal income in Kansas grew at the rate of 1.4 percent for the second quarter of 2006. That sounds pretty good, and Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius uses facts like this in her campaign ads.

    But our growth can be understood only when placed in context. Here’s what the Journal-World said:

    Kansans are putting more money in their pockets, but the extra income isn’t keeping up with increases for residents in other states.

    Personal income rose by 1.4 percent in Kansas during the second quarter, according to a report released Tuesday by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That rate of growth was surpassed by all but nine other states.

    (As has been mentioned, most of the growth in jobs in Kansas has been in government.)

    The governor must be hoping that voters get their information only from her campaign ads, and that they don’t take a moment to read an entire news story. Even if they do read a newspaper, it might not help much. I can’t find mention of this news in our state’s largest newspaper, The Wichita Eagle.

    Would Republican challenger Jim Barnett do much better leading Kansas? Although he earned a legislative vote rating of 100% from the Kansas Taxpayers Network this year, his voting in 2006 was very different from his past behavior. Before this year, Sen. Barnett had a lifetime ranking of only 28%. I would imagine that had Kathleen Sebelius been in the senate these same years, her rating would be similar. You do the math.

  • Kansas revenue growth lags

    Writing from Shreveport, Louisiana

    As Karl writes, things are getting better in Kansas, but not at anywhere near the rate the economy is growing nationwide. But that doesn’t seem to bother our governor.

    Kansas Revenue Growth Lags
    By Karl Peterjohn, Executive Director, Kansas Taxpayers Network

    Governor Sebelius continues to spread the message that the Kansas economy is growing again. State tax collections are rising. The expansion in tax revenue has allowed the big spending members of the Kansas legislature and the Kansas Supreme Court to go on a spending spree without anyone having to vote to raise state taxes in 2006.

    State Senator Jim Barnett, the Republican gubernatorial candidate opposing Sebelius, is citing federal job data showing that private job growth in Kansas is 50th among all the states while government job growth is the only area where Kansas employment is rising. At the same time the state’s unemployment rate continues to exceed the national average. Barnett has a proposal to get the state’s economy moving with a series of tax cuts to stimulate economic growth.

    Outside of Kansas and outside the boundaries of a Kansas election campaign, the federal tax collections from all 50 states are also reporting sizable growth. President Bush does not seem to be getting any credit for the growth in the national economy but there is strong growth in federal tax collections. The two rounds of federal tax cuts have dramatically changed federal tax policy nationally during his six years in office. The most recent Bush tax cut has now had a couple of years to take effect.

    Despite soaring levels of bipartisan federal spending growth the federal tax collections have managed to expand faster than congressional pork masters can grow it. Federal tax collections for the fiscal year that ended September 30 are 29.7 percent higher than two years ago. The federal budget deficit for last year was $260 billion, well below the $423 billion deficit projected by federal budget estimates last February.

    In August, 2005 Governor Sebelius’s office put out a news release touting the fact that state tax collections had grown over 7 percent for the fiscal year ending June 30. To compare the percentage growth of federal and Kansas tax revenues, one must adjust one of these fiscal years. Total state tax collections grew from $4.423 billion in 2004 to just over a billion dollars more, $5.440 billion as of September 30 putting receipts on a October 1 fiscal year. That is 19.7 percent growth.

    Nationally, at the same time federal tax revenues are growing over 50 percent faster and are approaching $2.4 trillion annually. Kansas tax revenue growth is significant but we are lagging way behind the national growth level percentage. Another point that would confirm this data is a new Tax Foundation study that surveyed business taxation covering all 50 states October 10, 2006. Kansas scored a mediocre 31st on this Tax Foundation score card (see www.taxfoundation.org) and was almost unchanged from the 2004 measurement looking at data from the beginning of Governor Sebelius’s first term.

    Meanwhile, in her campaign commercials Governor Sebelius touts a two year old Pacific Research Institute and last year’s Beacon Hill surveys claiming that Kansas has one of the best business and economic climates at 13th in the country. The Beacon Hill study examined a wide variety of criteria. The specific data included a student achievement measurement. Kansas students scored well using data from before the Montoy case spending began. In addition, Kansas scored highly in the number of engineering and science students graduating. Sadly, Kansas scored much lower in the number of engineering and science degree holders who were able to find jobs in Kansas after graduating.

    Kansas also scored well on Beacon Hill’s ranking for commuting times and rental cost for apartments but scored badly in venture capital, new company formation, and near the bottom of all 50 states when measuring government employment. Kansas also scored well in having a low percentage of citizens without health insurance and percentage of the population seeking post high school degrees too.

    Kansas’s economy is growing as reflected in the expansion in tax revenues but we are lagging behind the rest of the country when compared with federal tax growth from all 50 states. This is grist for both of the major party gubernatorial campaigns but this data actually helps the challenger, Senator Barnett, much more in his uphill race against Governor Sebelius.

  • Kansas Attorney General Election Will Set Spending Record

    Attorney General Election Will Set Spending Record
    By Karl Peterjohn, Executive Director Kansas Taxpayers Network

    Will the checkbook of the controversial abortion doctor from Wichita, George Tiller be large enough to defeat Attorney General Phill Kline’s bid for reelection? That is the underlying financial fact beneath the most expensive race for Kansas Attorney General in state history. The huge amount of spending for this position is now unfolding before voters’ eyes.

    The Democratic Party challenger for Kansas Attorney General is Johnson County District Attorney Paul Morrison. Morrison, who began running TV ads in mid-September, raised almost $1 million for his campaign treasury as reported to the state after the last reporting period in late July, just a few days before the August 1 primary.

    Morrison is the second of the two, well publicized liberal GOP defectors this year, the other being Governor Sebelius’ running mate Mark Parkinson, who have recently become democrats and are now statewide candidates.

    Both attorney general candidates began hard campaigning with a mid-September debate at a forum hosted by Wichita State University. Naturally, the abortion issue appeared but what is fascinating is the expansion of the abortion debate into other issues. Dr. George Tiller’s ProKanDo Political Action Committee (PAC) was not only attacking Phill Kline but labeled the attorney general as their number one election target. No surprise there. What was fascinating was the ProKanDo PAC flyer distributed at the state fair that blasted two fiscally conservative groups, the Club for Growth and Americans for Prosperity, that are not involved in the abortion battle or even social issues in general. Both groups oppose tax hikes and higher spending.

    Attorney General Phill Kline’s role in a variety of legal issues has gotten press attention. Kline’s office ended up playing a major role in trying to defend the state’s budget from the activist Kansas Supreme Court’s school finance ruling. Kline’s record as a leading advocate for tax reform when he chaired the Kansas house’s tax committee, cutting property and a wide range of other taxes in 1997 and 1998, and later trying to limit tax growth seems to have become part of the ProKanDo abortion advocates criticism of what this PAC calls, “…ultra conservative groups…” Abortion advocates now have a big government fiscal position according to Dr. Tiller’s PAC. That is likely to be unsettling news to fiscally conservative voters who are not partisans in the abortion battles as well as fiscal conservatives and libertarians who support keeping abortion legal.

    The abortion battle is also going to be fought on traditional legal issues. Kline had taken what was largely viewed as a “legal hail Mary” appeal of the Kansas Supreme Court’s latest ruling against the Kansas death penalty law to the U.S. Supreme Court.

    Kline, who has been criticized for not having extensive prosecutorial or a huge amount of litigation experience, not only took the Marsh death penalty case to the U.S. Supreme Court, but won this case this year. That is a major accomplishment for any lawyer. Kline will certainly point out that his opponent, Paul Morrison, who enjoys extensive experience as a prosecutor, cannot point to any U.S. Supreme Court wins in his resume.

    Morrison is hurt by the endorsement of Kline by 89 of 105 county sheriffs in Kansas. Even more painful for Morrison is the 89 sheriffs backing Kline include a majority of the Democratic sheriffs. It is notable that the largest and most liberal Kansas newspapers gave extensive news coverage to Morrison and Parkinson’s defections from the Republican Party earlier this year but not the sheriffs’ endorsement. The paucity of news coverage about the sheriffs’ endorsement was followed by endorsements from police groups like the Kansas Fraternal Order of Police as well as the Kansas State Troopers Association for Kline. These Kline endorsements have also been largely ignored on most daily news coverage in Kansas.

    The largest fact that has been ignored is campaign cash, PAC’s, and Dr. Tiller’s role in the 2006 attorney general race. Kline spent $700,000 in getting elected attorney general in 2002. Kline had faced a three-way GOP primary and spent roughly half of his funds just getting the Republican nomination according to his campaign spokesperson. Freestatemedia.org reports that Dr. Tiller provided $153,000 of last minute campaign donations into the last minute effort to defeat Phill Kline in 2002. Kline won by a paper thin margin of less than 5,000 votes four years ago. The Kline campaign attributes $300,000 in Dr. Tiller funds were spent against him from the 2002 attorney general’s race. News coverage about this last minute spending spree by the abortion lobby only appeared in a handful of Kansas newspapers and this belated coverage only appeared well after the 2002 election was history. That was unlike the independent campaign expenditures reporting on behalf of Sam Brownback’s campaigns for U.S. senator in 1996 and 1998.

    That six figure spending for attorney general will be far eclipsed in 2006. Dr. Tiller’s spending on behalf of his attorney general candidate, Paul Morrison, will appear in force after the reporting deadline is passed. Expect a new PAC to appear to fund these last minute ads that will disappear right after the election using the plan that almost beat Kline in 2002. The key question in Kansas politics is: will Dr. Tiller have enough cash to change enough votes with a last minute attack that will be successful to unseat the Republican, Phill Kline?

  • Kansas continues to suffer from job growth deficit

    This press release from the Kansas Chapter of Americans For Prosperity calls attention to the poor growth in jobs under the leadership of Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius, contrary to what her television advertisements claim.

    We should not construe that Kansas State Senator and Republican challenger Jim Barnett would do much better. Although he earned a legislative vote rating of 100% from the Kansas Taxpayers Network this year, his voting in 2006 was very different from his past behavior. Before this year, Sen. Barnett had a lifetime ranking of only 28%.

    Kansas Continues to Suffer from Job Growth Deficit

    Kansas is #50 in private sector job growth this year
    Kansas is #1 in government job growth this year

    TOPEKA – The Kansas chapter of the grassroots group Americans for Prosperity today released the results of an analysis of recent employment data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

    “Just in case our Governor and policy makers don’t get it by now, hopefully this data makes it crystal clear and our economy is struggling. In order to address this problem, we have to recognize that we have a problem, and unfortunately, too many of our elected leaders respond to this challenge with misleading information, meaningless anecdotes and defensiveness.”

    • From January 2006 to August 2006, Kansas ranks #50 in private job growth, losing 3,800 jobs (.35%)
    • Kansas is only one of three states to have an actual loss of jobs in this calendar year.
    • From January 2006 to August 2006, Kansas ranks #1 in government job growth, gaining 15,800, an increase of more than 6%
    • Kansas employment peaked in March 2001 and has since lost jobs.

    (Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, data seasonally adjusted)

    Americans For Prosperity Foundation (AFPF) is a nationwide organization of citizen leaders committed to advancing every individual’s right to economic freedom and opportunity. AFPF believes reducing the size and scope of government is the best safeguard to ensuring individual productivity and prosperity for all Americans. AFPF educates and engages citizens in support of restraining state and federal government growth, and returning government to its constitutional limits. For more information, visit www.afpks.org

  • Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius and Kansas jobs

    A recent television advertisement by Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius touts “… nearly 2.5 years of positive job growth.” The viewer is, by my estimation, supposed to credit the governor for this growth.

    But a look behind the scenes reveals a situation that only a politician could take pride in. Our governor must be hoping that people won’t take a moment to examine the reality.

    As reported in The Wichita Eagle on July 7, 2006:

    Kansas’ job growth was fourth-worst in the nation during the first quarter, according to a quarterly report by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

    The number of jobs in Kansas grew at a rate of 0.4 percent in the year ending March 31. The national rate was 1.6 percent.

    The fastest-growing sectors were in government and construction, which each added about 4,000 jobs.

    If it wasn’t for government jobs growing at a rapid rate, our state’s job figures would be even worse.

    A quick gathering of some statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that for every year from 2002 to 2005, Kansas lags the nation in job growth rate, and by a large amount.

    There have been some periods of spectacular job growth in Kansas. The Kansas City Star reported in March 2005 “Nonfarm payroll employment in Kansas grew from January to February by the largest percentage increase of any state, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported this morning. ” But this growth was sustained for only one month, and may be the result of some statistical anomaly.

    For growth in jobs over a period of time, however, our state is lagging far behind the country as a whole, and this is something Governor Sebelius is proud of.

  • Kansas Governor’s Race Heats Up

    Kansas Governor’s Race Heats Up
    By Karl Peterjohn, Executive Director, Kansas Taxpayers Network

    The first of a series of debates highlighting significant differences between the two leading candidates for governor have begun in Kansas. The kick off was the state fair debate between Governor Sebelius and her GOP opponent state Senator Jim Barnett September 9.

    The conventional wisdom is that this gubernatorial race was going to be a snoozer with Sebelius’ huge fund raising advantage but a number of minor events, none hugely significant by themselves, indicates that the Sebelius reelection campaign has some problems. A decline in poll numbers according to a Rasmussen poll in late August had Sebelius with only a 48-to-37 percent lead over Barnett.

    The real problem for Sebelius is that her poll number dropping below 50 percent is bad news at a time when Barnett is not advertising on TV and Sebelius’s ads still rule the airwaves. It is a bad sign when your poll numbers are slipping and only your ads are being broadcast. The controversy over several of the Sebelius ads hasn’t helped.

    As this is being written, Sen. Barnett has taken a modest lead at the state fair straw poll conducted by the Secretary of State. That’s a change from four years ago when Sebelius easily won that straw poll. Nationally, Professor Larry Sabato’s ranking on the Kansas gubernatorial race dropped a notch from “solid” to “likely” retention by Democrats.

    A much larger problem is the new state’s budget estimates just came out showing that a major state budget problem is real. That is a point that Sen. Barnett has been complaining about beginning at the state fair debate. State revenues are not likely to grow fast enough to match the spending hikes demanded by the activist Kansas Supreme Court and government spending advocates. That could lead to the state needing an additional $262-to-519 million if revenue growth continue lagging.

    This bad budget news is not getting much news coverage. If the average Kansan knew about this fiscal problem, the gubernatorial campaign would shift in a fiscal direction hurting the incumbent. Governor Sebelius does not want to spend the last two months of this campaign debating her 2007 tax hike proposal. In addition, she does not want to talk about the Democrat dominated Kansas Supreme Court and how the tax ‘n spend liberals from the Kansas Supreme Court, to a majority of state legislators, to the governor’s office have created a new fiscal mess.

    In 2006, major tax cuts were enacted in nearby Oklahoma and Texas. Billions in property, income, and estate tax relief were enacted. Other states enacted significant tax reform too. Sadly, Kansas revenue growth in the last two years is roughly half of the national average. The large economic stimulus in neighboring states enacted this year is huge when compared with the paltry $35 million in personal property tax cuts for business enacted by the Kansas legislature over the next two years. Contrast this with the $1 billion in increased government school spending plan enacted this year in Topeka.

    Two other issues where Senator Barnett scored well at the state fair debate were the role of the Kansas Supreme Court in setting spending as well as the state providing a special tuition break for illegal aliens at Kansas state universities. Judicial activism is an issue helping Barnett but the state university subsidy for illegal aliens’ tuition is one that resonates enough that the governor’s campaign felt compelled to respond with a new radio ad in mid-September.

    Barnett touted his proposal for strengthening the state’s economy with four tax cuts and reducing the growth rate in state spending. Barnett also blasted the governor’s unsuccessful proposal to raise property, income, and sales taxes. Sebelius fired back criticizing Barnett for backing the Graves tax hike on sales and cigarettes in 2002.

    Sebelius is at a disadvantage over four years ago since she has her record as an incumbent to defend. In addition, Sebelius’ legislative votes helped create the statewide property tax in 1992 and set a tax hike record, voted to raise that property tax again in 1994, and proposed an additional hike as governor. These are fiscal votes that will confirm the traditional, tax ‘n spend liberal label that Sen. Barnett will try to stick on Gov. Sebelius if he can raise the cash to advertise. Sebelius, who has the strong backing of Wichita abortion Dr. George Tiller’s ProKanDo PAC money, remains by far the record setting fundraiser in Kansas gubernatorial history so her ads will dominate the airwaves. Sebelius remains the favorite to win reelection despite these problems.

    No matter how lively the Kansas gubernatorial race becomes during the last two months of the campaign it will struggle to come close to the intensity of newly minted Democrat Paul Morrison’s effort to remove Republican incumbent Phill Kline as Kansas Attorney General

    Karl Peterjohn is the executive director of the Kansas Taxpayers Network and is a former California Department of Finance budget analyst and newspaper reporter.

  • The Kansas school lawsuit that makes sense

    Recently The Wichita Eagle editorialized on the recent school finance lawsuit in Kansas, quoting USD 259 (Wichita) school board president Sarah Skelton as pleased with the “great return” on the district’s investment in funding the suit. As much more money as the public schools will be receiving, it is not as much as was asked for, and USD 259 is preparing to ask for even more spending from a bond issue. Public comments by lead attorney Alan Rupe hint at another lawsuit, perhaps in federal court.

    Lawsuits like the one in Kansas are commonplace in America. The standard remedy sought is more money. In Kansas, the legislature was sternly told to “do their job” and find more money to, as school board vice-president Lynn Rogers said, “to do what was the right thing for the kids.”

    Evidently it doesn’t matter that we have been spending more and more on public schools for a long time. Public schools seem to be getting worse and worse. Here’s some evidence. From the National Academy of Sciences report “Rising Above the Gathering Storm” published last year:

    Fewer than one-third of US fourth grade and eighth grade students performed at or above a level called “proficient” in mathematics; “proficiency” was considered the ability to exhibit competence with challenging subject matter. Alarmingly, about one-third of the fourth graders and one-fifth of the eighth graders lacked the competence to perform basic mathematical computations.

    A recent study by the American Institutes for Research contained this:

    More than 75 percent of students at 2-year colleges and more than 50 percent of students at 4-year colleges do not score at the proficient level of literacy. This means that they lack the skills to perform complex literacy tasks, such as comparing credit card offers with different interest rates or summarizing the arguments of newspaper editorials.

    According to the report “Reading Between The Lines” issued by ACT earlier this year, only “51% of ACT-tested high school graduates met ACT’s College Readiness Benchmark for Reading, demonstrating their readiness to handle the reading requirements for typical credit-bearing first-year college coursework.”

    There is little doubt that schools need a lot of improvement. The problem with the recent school lawsuit is that the remedy it asked for — more spending — is probably not going to produce the desired results, if your goal is to produce better-educated children. (If your goal is a larger education bureaucracy, more spending will produce that.)

    The lawsuit I would like to see pursued in Kansas would ask for a meaningful remedy. In July, a case titled Crawford v. Davy was filed in New Jersey. This case asks for two remedies: “elimination of compulsory attendance zones that prevent children from attending better-performing public schools outside of their districts, and provision to the students’ families their children’s pro rata share of state and local educational funding so they may attend a functioning public or private school.”

    In effect, Crawford v. Davy asks for school choice and vouchers as the remedy. No extra spending is asked for. No additional layers of bureaucracy. Just the power of choice.

    We desperately need to rely on the power of markets and individuals, instead of bureaucrats and politicians, to improve public education in Kansas. Consider this: if it is true that Kansas schools are underfunded, they have been since 1999, the year the present suit was filed. (Presumably they were also underfunded for some years before that.) The legislature resisted the full remedy that the Kansas Supreme Court ordered, and what was passed was not funded in all years. The Wichita Eagle editorializes over and over about the legislature “not doing its job” and “playing games on schools.” It now seems possible that a child who entered public school at the time the problems with funding were noticed will have graduated from high school (maybe even college) by the time things are “fixed,” and that assumes the state will continue to apply the fix that’s been mandated, and that the fix works.

    Past experience shows that spending more money on schools won’t help. We must try something else.

  • Tax funded lobbyists spending revealed

    Tax Funded Lobbyists Spending Revealed
    By Karl Peterjohn, Kansas Taxpayers Network

    There are lobbyists and there are taxpayer funded lobbyists roaming the halls of the statehouse during the legislative sessions. A small window on the taxpayer funded lobbying opened up following the two separate legal actions of Attorney General Phill Kline and the Topeka Capital-Journal in seeking spending data from the Schools for Fair Funding organization. The attorney general and the newspaper deserve a pat-on-the-back for fighting for the disclosure of this information.

    Schools for Fair Funding is the tax funded group of 19 medium and large public school districts that do not have enough tax funds for their classrooms but have plenty of cash for lawsuits. They even have a euphemism for this spending. At an August news conference Winston Brooks, the superintendent of the Wichita public schools that is one of the 19 school districts, called this spending an “investment.” Wichita public schools spent $175,000 for this lawsuit and lobbying effort.

    The school districts could afford this since many of them are carrying large cash balances and dumping funds into savings accounts and certificates of deposit. This is a statewide issue and not just an issue in some Johnson County public school districts. Wichita public schools’ unencumbered cash balance at the end of their 2005-06 school year was a record setting $82,456,158 or 15.2% increase over the previous year. Some investment.

    The school districts succumbed to this legal pressure generated by these two lawsuits and issued their expenditures August 24. Over $2.9 million in tax funds was spent by the school districts with over $2.2 million for lawyers but also included in this spending over six years was $474,000 for two statehouse lobbyists for this group. This reported expenditure is the tip of a spending iceberg that covers the over 100 lobbyists registered to lobby on behalf of tax funded cities, counties, schools, special taxing districts, elected official organizations, and colleges in this state.

    Your tax funds are used to lobby for more sales tax authority this year for cities and counties — which the legislature and Governor Sebelius granted. The schools lobbied for millions and millions of additional state tax funds and got even more. In the past the city and county lobbies successfully killed the property tax lid in 1999. Is it any wonder that your property taxes are rising?

    There is a crying need for additional disclosure about tax funded lobbying in Kansas. This lobbying is the tip of the iceberg since the politically active local officials at city hall and the courthouse are the first ones to receive statehouse information from their lobbyists. Naturally, elected officials are quite politically well connected even without having their tax funded lobbyists.

    These facts are well known among statehouse lobbyists. Sadly, these facts are not well known by average Kansans. The revelation of almost $1/2 million in tax funds being spent by Schools For Fair Funding for just two lobbyists is the tip of a much larger government lobbying iceberg and abuse of taxpayers in this state.

    —–

    Karl Peterjohn is the executive director of the Kansas Taxpayers Network and is a former California Department of Finance budget analyst and newspaper reporter.