The Emporia Gazette

February 12, 2012

• Headlines
• Sports
• Forums
• Weather
• Classifieds

• Help
• Log in
• Home

• E-mail story
• Post a comment
• iPod friendly version

Education, immigration, and health care — three of the biggest issues in both the state and the nation — are at or near the top of the agenda for Emporia’s three state legislators. Here’s The Gazette’s weekly look at what Sen. Jim Barnett, Rep. Don Hill and Rep. Peggy Mast were working on last week and what issues they’ll be examining in the week ahead:

Sen. Jim Barnett

Barnett said he was pleased last week when the Senate passed Bill 628, which would assure that funding for Unified School District 253 in Emporia would drop no more than 2 percent from last year. The bill, introduced as a result of the Tyson layoffs, gives the same protection to USD 251, north Lyon County; USD 252, southern Lyon County; and USD 284, Chase County. It passed by a 39-0 vote.

Also significant in Barnett’s eyes was Bill 443, a measure that encourages Kansans to buy long-term care insurance.

“If you have long-term care ... and let’s say your policy pays for $100,000 of nursing home coverage, you would then be allowed to keep that $100,000 in your estate,” Barnett said. “Currently, what happens is people have to spend down to nearly their very last dollar, and if people buy long-term care, then they can retain those funds in their estate.”

Barnett also lauded the passage of Bill 501 to create the Kansas Tourism Corporation, a collaborative body between the state and private interests that would be responsible for increasing tourism.

This Tuesday, an immigration reform bill Barnett cosponsored will be the subject of an opposition hearing. Among other provisions, Senate Bill 458 would require Kansas employers to use the federal government’s E-Verify database to verify that a potential employee is in the U.S. legally. Proponents of the bill spoke at a hearing last week.

On Wednesday, Barnett will hold a hearing in the Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee on the impact of climate change, a topic Barnett said was important in light of the debate over the expansion of the Holcomb coal-fired energy plant.

“We’ll discuss the science of global warming and the impact of climate change on health,” he said.

Rep. Don Hill

Hill spent a great deal of time in committee activity late last week.

“All in all, I feel like it was a pretty good week and feel like while nothing Earth-shattering was accomplished as far as legislation passed this week, it was positive,” he said.

Hill said he will be watching closely this week as the Health and Human Services Subcommittee begins discussing initiatives from the Kansas Health Policy Authority. He’s not a member of the subcommittee, but Rep. Peggy Mast is.

House Bill 2776, which Hill introduced to minimize the damage on Emporia Unified School District 253’s state funding after the Tyson layoffs, has been set aside for now. Instead, Hill will be the chair of a subcommittee that will work a Senate bill, No. 426, to serve as a vehicle for House Bill 2776. He said the subcommittee’s first meeting will be Wednesday morning. Senate Bill 426 is different from House Bill 628.

“Our objective will be to address the situation caused by the natural disasters in 2007, especially in Greensburg and in several communities in southeast Kansas,” as well as Emporia’s disaster situation, he said. The subcommittee will try to draft policy that will apply to future disasters.

“We don’t have policy on this type of extraordinary circumstance, and that’s why we’re in need of having to do basically special legislation,” Hill said.

Rep. Peggy Mast

Mast said she had a long day at work on Thursday dealing with several education proposals — all of which failed except for a bill that gave smaller school districts financial incentive to consolidate.

One failed bill would have provided more funding to some other larger school districts, including USD 253.

“It would have benefited the Emporia district by over $300,000 for 2009,” she said. “... It was just not a good day for new initiatives in education, I would say.”

Mast believed those education bills failed because of opposition from various education groups, which take different stances on different issues.

More positive news for Mast came when a “health parity” bill she authored passed the House 123-0. That bill is designed to expand opportunities for groups of people without health insurance to pool together and fund each other’s health care needs. She said the Mennonite Church has had such programs for a long time.

“You pay a certain amount in to this organization, and they take the money and send it out to different people that have health care needs at the time,” she said. “Then when you come up and you need help, then they come to your aid as well.”

This week, Mast will begin her work on the health policy subcommittee and believes that will take up a large chunk of her week when the House is back in session on Wednesday. She said she hasn’t yet gotten a chance to look at the Health Policy Authority’s initiatives in depth.