By Tim Carpenter, Kansas Reflector
TOPEKA — Gov. Laura Kelly made an end-of-session plea to the Kansas Legislature after signing a massive state budget bill investing in economic development, water resources and disability services while triggering more than 35 vetoes of provisions labeled as unwarranted earmarks, power grabs or financial gaffes.
Kelly, who has leaned on her veto pen in disputes with House and Senate Republicans since taking office in 2019, said she was concerned the budget endangered the state’s long-term fiscal health and could jeopardize funding for essential programs and services that mattered the most to Kansans. She said it was folly for GOP leadership in the Legislature to adjourn the annual session before release of updated revenue reports evaluating financial implications of the budget.
“This budget will put Kansas in the red by fiscal year 2028,” Kelly said Wednesday in a message to the Legislature. “Given the ongoing economic uncertainty we are experiencing, I urge the Legislature to seriously consider revisiting this budget.”
She said Kansas demonstrated financial resilience during the past seven years after enduring damaging tax and spending decisions under a previous governor. She repeated a warning to not ignore the history of careless decisions leading deep cuts, unnecessary debt and higher taxes.
“We risk losing all of that progress and returning to the dark days of four-day school weeks and crumbling roads and bridges if we don’t correct the structural imbalance we are currently facing,” the governor said.
Kelly said she was enthusiastic about portions of Senate Bill 125 that provided $6 million to safeguard Kansas’ water supply, a $1.75 million increase in matching funds for local conservation districts and $3 million for a pilot project to manage sedimentation in John Redmond Reservoir.
She thanked the Legislature for $50 million invested in the state’s aviation industry because those commitments would continue “the state’s historic success” in economy development. She praised lawmakers for allocating $1 million to create rural remote workspaces as well as investments to attract innovative businesses in cybersecurity and biotechnology.
The budget appropriately invested in early childhood education while adding $10 million for special education programs in the state’s K-12 public education system, Kelly said. There was $1.25 million to expand rural child care, she said. The governor appreciated $14 million to help 200 people with intellectual or developmental disabilities move off the state’s waiting list for services.
However, the governor said it was troubling the Legislature didn’t address rising health costs by expanding eligibility for Medicaid. Forty states and the District of Columbia have opened that door to billions of dollars in federal funding aimed at lower-income residents without quality, affordable health care.
“Not only will expanding Medicaid make it easier and more affordable for Kansas families to access health care,” she said, “it would also have substantial economic benefits for Kansans.”
She line-item vetoed a provision requiring the state to unenroll and reenroll people in the Medicaid program at an annual cost of $3.5 million to $4.3 million. She said federal regulations forbid caregivers and parents from being denied Medicaid health care coverage without an individual review. In addition, the governor said, the concept was a “highly inefficient, administratively burdensome, costly process.”
Kelly, known as a public education advocate as governor and during her 14-year tour in the Kansas Senate, said she was disappointed with a collection of budget decisions regarding K-12 schools. She was critical of the elimination of funding for teacher professional development programs and literacy training for teachers.
She objected to the “extremely troubling” decision by the Legislature to finance grants for emergency medical equipment in private schools with money that should be applied to public schools. She suggested the maneuver raised questions about whether lawmakers were challenging Kansas Supreme Court rulings in the Gannon v. State school finance lawsuit that concluded the Legislature violated the Kansas Constitution by inadequately funding schools.
“While I have corrected this via a line-item veto, I remain extremely concerned about the future of education funding in Kansas,” Kelly said. “The Legislature must stop playing games with school finance, especially when it underfunds our public schools and could land the state back in court, relitigating issues we’ve worked to solve in a bipartisan manner.”
The governor also vetoed a budget item that directed school districts to adopt an online curriculum not vetted by the Kansas Board of Education. Constitutional authority for curriculum decisions rested with the elected 10-member state Board of Education, she said.
Kelly used a veto pen to dispatch the appropriation of $3 million to the state treasurer, rather than to an executive branch agency, for operation of the “pregnancy compassion awareness” program. Her veto message recalled the August 2022 statewide vote that defeated a proposed amendment to the Constitution reversing a state Supreme Court decision that women had a basic constitutional right to terminate a pregnancy.
“I continue to believe that housing the pregnancy crisis center program in the office of the state treasurer is inappropriate and simply politically motivated,” the governor said. “Kansas women facing unplanned pregnancies deserve meaningful support from medical professionals who can provide evidence-based guidance, not from largely unregulated pregnancy resource centers.”
In addition, Kelly vetoed creation of an “unvetted program with no guardrails” in the office of state treasurer that would help expand the state’s workforce. She said it was inefficient for the Legislature to defund an existing workforce program, “Love, Kansas,” in the Kansas Department of Commerce.
Kelly vetoed a provision in the budget that would have increased the cost of office space for journalists in the Capitol.
“This item appears to be targeted at the Kansas Capitol press corps to stymie their ability to effectively report on the actions occurring in the people’s house,” the governor said. “Provisions like this set a dangerous precedent and undermine one of the core principles enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.”
Kelly said she couldn’t allow the Legislature to approve a no-bid $1 million earmark for the O’Connell Children’s Shelter in Lawrence. She said the expenditure circumvented established methods of awarding grants that would include rigorous review of qualified applicants.
“We have made great progress towards eliminating no-bid contracts recently,” Kelly said. “We should not take an unnecessary step backwards.”
Kelly vetoed a directive that the state Department of Commerce devote $500,000 to Wichita State University’s aviation research institute to work on unmanned aircraft systems and $500,000 to the Salina campus of Kansas State University for development of a commercial credentialing process for drones.
“The Department of Commerce did not request this item and it did not go through the agency vetting process,” she said. “I cannot ignore the deficiencies in the process that led to this being included in the budget.”
The governor vetoed a $750,000 earmark for a feasibility study on launching a dental school at Wichita State. She urged higher education and dentistry professionals to collaborate on a strategy for starting the school and present it to the 2026 Legislature.
Meanwhile, Kelly vetoed $500,000 to the Kansas Bureau of Investigation for a forensic genetic genealogy DNA analysis system to identify human remains. The KBI didn’t request the funding through the normal appropriations process, the governor said.
Kelly deleted a plan calling on the Kansas Highway Patrol to collaborate with a third-party entity to build an aviation hangar in Wichita that would be leased by the state.
She also vetoed “poorly written” provisos directing the state Department of Health and Environment to spend not less than $250,000 on preventing transmission of tuberculosis and a separate requirement that KDHE spend up to $96,000 to control tuberculosis. A $263,000 earmark for cerebral palsy research, not requested by KDHE, was vetoed because “intent behind this budget proviso is unclear,” the governor said.
