Remember the company that hired illegal immigrants to build the border fence? Here’s more ironic news: Five of the people who cleaned the home of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff were undocumented. “Our Homeland Security can’t police their own home. How can they police our borders?” complained the owner of the cleaning company.
Like it or not, the times call for the drastic measures being taken in Topeka to deal with the state’s money problems, including temporarily shortchanging school districts by 25 percent this month and delaying the next phase of the endless Capitol restoration.
It’s hard to argue with either step when you have state budget director Duane Goossen saying, as he did of the schools payment, that “we do not have enough cash in the bank.”
And House Speaker Melvin Neufeld, R-Ingalls, was right in saying, “It’s very bad to go ahead and bid additional renovation projects at the state Capitol at the same time you’re talking about having to reduce education spending and reduce Medicaid.”
Still, House Minority Leader Dennis McKinney, D-Greensburg, made a worthy argument that legislative leaders should keep in mind when they reconsider the Capitol project next year: “Now we have construction costs that are low, we have people unemployed and 3 percent interest rates. Now is the time to build highways and renovate the Statehouse because it costs the taxpayers less, has a better impact on the economy and puts people to work.”
Don’t be surprised if the latest scandal in Illinois state politics has a ripple effect in Kansas in the form of discussion of whether to strip the governor of her authority to fill vacancies of statewide offices and Kansas’ seats in the U.S. Senate. The past two legislative sessions have seen talk of taking away that power from Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, first because of Sen. Sam Brownback’s ill-fated presidential run and later because of then-Attorney General Paul Morrison’s resignation. In addition to the Illinois mess, in which the governor allegedly tried to sell a U.S. Senate seat to the highest bidder, Kansas change advocates can now cite Sebelius’ appointment of two Democrats to statewide offices over the past year – Attorney General Steve Six and incoming state Treasurer Dennis McKinney (replacing Rep.-elect Lynn Jenkins). But as we’ve observed before, Kansas Republicans surely wouldn’t see a problem in such gubernatorial power if they’d been able to elect a governor this decade. By the way, when any of Kansas’ seats in the U.S. House become vacant, state law calls for the governor to call a special election.
Six-term Rep. Dennis Moore, D-Lenexa, has ended rumors about his future by telling the Kansas City Star, “I do intend to run again.” Speculation to the contrary may have emanated from the National Journal’s Hotline blog, which last week cited unnamed sources close to the congressman. That left many to wonder whether Moore was among those eyeing Sam Brownback’s Senate seat, which is opening up in 2010.
