REMEMBER WHEN the Legislature cut taxes and then balanced the books by cutting aid to counties and cities? The result, of course, was that local governments were forced to raise taxes to make up for the taxes cut by the state.
The only winners in that one were the legislators running for re-election who could boast that they had cut their constituents’ taxes.
Some legislators are trying to pull the same trick again, but this time, they are being more direct about it.
The issue at hand is the deteriorating condition of the state’s public universities. The schools say they have a $600 million backlog of repairs, and no money to even begin.
Last week, a group of House Republicans decided to try to dump part of the problem back on the communities that house the university campuses. House Bill 2593 would allow those counties — and only those counties — to raise their sales-tax rates by a 10th of a cent to help the local universities do repairs.
That means that, although the universities serve students from all over the state, only the communities that house universities would be expected to pay for their repair and upkeep.
Why not just dissolve the state university system, designate all the schools as “county universities” and be done with it?
Perhaps the House will come up with a plan to allow the universities to charge out-of-county tuition to balance the burden. A student from Chase County, say, would pay a few hundred dollars more a year to attend Emporia State University.
Have these legislators decided that higher education is just too expensive for Kansas?
The universities belong to the state and the whole state benefits from the education and culture they provide. As a matter of simple fairness, the whole state must be responsible for the upkeep of the schools.
Phil_Dillon (anonymous) says...
Scott
Our local incumbents aren't immune to the skullduggergy. They presented and then touted a surplus in the 2006 budget of over $300K. The problem was that it was a shadow sur-plus, built on deferred purchase of equipment for fire and police departments.
As to the issue at hand I'd say that if the state wants to play that game then we can kick them out of office too.
April 3, 2007 at 4:32 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )