Several House races this past election were decided by no more than a handful of votes. One in particular, the 16th Dist. House race in Johnson County, was initially determined to be a 27 vote margin for the Republican. A final canvas reversed the result in favor of the Democrat by 4 votes and a recount narrowed the margin to three. Due to irregularities in the processing of provisional ballots by the Johnson County Election Commissioner an election contest was filed and a Johnson County judge found the margin of victory for the Democrat to be a mere two votes.
By law the election contest was sent to the House for final resolution. I was appointed to chair the select committee on the election contest and after 6 days of hearings our committee of 3 Republicans and 3 Democrats agreed with the judge and determined that the Democrat Representative should be seated. By law the election could have been determined by a vote of the full House but the Republican challenger gracefully withdrew his election contest on the basis of our committee’s work.
I have served on two other contested election committees. One, in 1991, involved a contested ballot faxed back to Kansas by a deployed soldier serving in Saudi Arabia during Desert Storm. His vote was one of a handful that determined the winner in the extremely close election. The other, in 1995, resulted in a tie vote after judicial review and House review and the outcome was determined by drawing a colored backgammon chip out of a hat. Each election I stress the importance of your vote. These three close elections illustrate the importance of every vote.
As Vice-Chairman of the House Education Budget Subcommittee I’ve spent the last week listening to the various budget proposals of each of the Regents Universities and the Community Colleges. All have stressed the need for millions of additional dollars for repairs to their aging buildings. When asked why they are so far behind on maintenance the schools have complained that state funding has not kept up with their maintenance needs, although most have enjoyed the benefits of newly constructed facilities on their respective campuses. New construction has moved maintenance of existing structures to a lower priority, apparently. We’re considering a requirement that all new facilities, whether built with public or private funds, be sufficiently endowed with corresponding ongoing maintenance and upkeep funds.
The current maintenance and upkeep needs are said to be in the $600-700M range in spite of a move several years ago to issue bonds to help with maintenance needs. The Governor has proposed significant increases in turnpike fees to fund a portion of the costs, a move roundly criticized by the Kansas Turnpike Authority and the Kansas Motor Carriers Association in particular.
This week, our Education Budget Committee hears from K-12 public education interests. With the legislature taking quick action to set aside the 2nd and 3rd years of the 3-year school finance plan passed last year, this budget should be fairly easy to reach agreement on, although we expect to hear requests, as we do every year, for more funds even though the Court has now found our level of funding to be adequate. Additional funding to implement all-day kindergarten everywhere is on the agenda.