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Headlines
State Budget Transparency: A Look Behind the Numbers
Most states are now wrapping up their 2013-2014 budget cycles, and apparently they're in good shape too. But thanks to the lack of budget transparency, state and local governments are estimated to owe up to $4 trillion more than they have set aside for pensions and retiree health care.
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Policy Brief
Financial Incentives Are The "Core" Of New Education Standards
The implementation of the Common Core State Standards Initiative is forcing states to determine when a “good offer” becomes an offer that cannot be refused. This report will explain the issues, in terms of both finances and fedearlism, surrounding the adoption of the Commone Core.
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Research
Public Sector Pension Reform: Addressing Pressing Fiscal Realities from a Long-Term Perspective
There are persistent fiscal and demographic challenges in most states. The public sector workforce is aging as the baby boom cohort moves towards and into traditional retirement ages. Budgetary pressures at the state and local level make it difficult to increase plan funding and maintain the size of the public sector workforce.
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Headlines
Report Says State Budget Surpluses Don't Mean That Much
A new study shows that many states could end the current fiscal year with surpluses in their general funds. While that may seem like good news, it's probably too early to get excited. That's because those positive numbers are largely the result of one-time influxes of tax revenue that came when investors sold off assets late last calendar year to avoid higher federal tax rates that came in 2013.
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Headlines
State pensions in America: Ruinous Promises
States cannot pretend to be in good financial health unless they tackle pensions.
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Budget timeline: Annual (although smaller agencies may receive biennial budgets)
Fiscal Year starts: July 1
Find the current state budget here.
Find the legislative session calendar here.
Find the current legislative leaders here.
Gov. Sam Brownback
Office of Governor Sam Brownback
State Capitol
2nd Floor
Topeka, KS 66612-1590
Phone: (785) 296-3232
Fax: (785) 296-7973
http://governor.ks.gov/
Steve Anderson, Director of the Budget
Division of the Budget
900 SW Jackson, Suite 504
Landon State Office Building
Topeka, KS 66612
Phone (785) 296-2436
Fax: (785) 296-0231
http://budget.ks.gov/
budget.info@budget.ks.gov
steve.anderson@budget.ks.gov
Kansas is required to pass a "balanced budget." Section 75-3722 of the state law requires the "secretary of administration, on advice of the director of the budget, must assure that expenditures for any particular fiscal year will not exceed the available resources of the general fund or any special revenue fund for that fiscal year." Kansas law forbids the carrying over of a deficit from one year to the next.
The State has five major governmental funds: the General Fund, the Transportation Fund, the Transportation-Capital Projects Fund, the Health Policy Authority Fund, and the Social and Rehabilitation Fund. Annual budgets are adopted on a cash basis with encumbrance modifications for all governmental funds. All major funds are budgeted except for the Transportation-Capital Projects Fund. [from the Institute for Truth in Accounting]
Find the state's bond ratings here.
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Pensions :
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RESEARCH
Public Sector Pension Reform: Addressing Pressing Fiscal Realities from a Long-Term Perspective
There are persistent fiscal and demographic challenges in most states. The public sector workforce is aging as the baby boom cohort moves towards and into traditional retirement ages. Budgetary pressures at the state and local level make it difficult to increase plan funding and maintain the size of the public sector workforce.
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HEADLINES
State pension reforms to result in more hybrid pension plans -- report
More states will create hybrid plans in the future because of the less-volatile contribution levels and the fact that the defined contribution components are portable for a workforce that is now increasingly more mobile, according to a new report.
- View All Kansas articles
K-12 Education :
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POLICY BRIEF
Financial Incentives Are The "Core" Of New Education Standards
The implementation of the Common Core State Standards Initiative is forcing states to determine when a “good offer” becomes an offer that cannot be refused. This report will explain the issues, in terms of both finances and fedearlism, surrounding the adoption of the Commone Core.
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RESEARCH
The School Staffing Surge: Decades of Employment Growth in America's Public Schools, Part II
Public schools grew staffing at a rate four times faster than the increase in students over that time period. Of those personnel, teachers' numbers increased 252 percent, while administrators and other non-teaching staff experienced growth of 702 percent, more than seven times the increase in students.
- View All Kansas articles
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Solutions:
How Reality-Based Budgeting Can Permanently Resolve State Budget Gaps
State Budget Solutions recommends that state legislators take action in 2013 to resolve the serious state financial crises by changing their focus from inputs to outcomes by redesigning budgets from the ground up based on priorities and performance.
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Solutions:
How to Prevent Future Pension Crises
The time for state and local governments to offer defined contribution retirement plans that protect both taxpayer dollars and public employee retirement security is now.
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Solutions:
State Lawmaker’s Guide to Evaluating Medicaid Expansion Projections
Supporters of Obamacare claim that expanding Medicaid will entail little to no cost to state governments, since the federal government will fund the vast majority of the additional costs. Indeed, some analyses project states achieving savings from adopting the expansion. However, state lawmakers should be wary of accepting such analyses at face value.
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Solutions:
Medicaid Is Broken—Let the States Fix It
Block-granting Medicaid is the best way to deliver better, cost-effective care to the most vulnerable Americans.
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Solutions:
The Case for Reform: Prisons
Prisons are supremely important, but they are also a supremely expensive government program, and thus prison systems must be held to the highest standards of accountability.
- View All Solutions
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Public Sector Pension Reform: Addressing Pressing Fiscal Realities from a Long-Term Perspective
There are persistent fiscal and demographic challenges in most states. The public sector workforce is aging as the baby boom cohort moves towards and into traditional retirement ages. Budgetary pressures at the state and local level make it difficult to increase plan funding and maintain the size of the public sector workforce.
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State pensions in America: Ruinous Promises
States cannot pretend to be in good financial health unless they tackle pensions.
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State pension reforms to result in more hybrid pension plans -- report
More states will create hybrid plans in the future because of the less-volatile contribution levels and the fact that the defined contribution components are portable for a workforce that is now increasingly more mobile, according to a new report.
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In face of massive unfunded liability, states still slow to pre-fund retiree healthcare benefits
The size of unfunded retiree healthcare liabilities varies widely by state. While some states have been making slow progress towards pre-funding these obligations, other have been contributing to them on a pay-as-you-go basis. As a result of the latter approach, combined unfunded liabilities are $425 billion under the most optimistic assumptions.
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BLOG
Discount rates and the fair-market valuation pension critique
At its core, the debate over how to properly fund public pension plans starts with how to accurately value liabilities so that governments can meet their obligations in the future.
- View All Pensions
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BLOG: K-12 Education, Federal Government Impact, Federal Government Impact
Common Core raises questions about government involvement, financial and otherwise, in local issues
Putting aside the merits or shortcomings of the Common Core, accepting national standards over which states have no control weakens the role that local officials have traditionally had in K-12 education.
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BLOG: Pensions
Discount rates and the fair-market valuation pension critique
At its core, the debate over how to properly fund public pension plans starts with how to accurately value liabilities so that governments can meet their obligations in the future.
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BLOG: Higher Education, Spending
Who is the highest paid state employee in your state?
Time to add a new diagram to the state budget and policy playbook--your state's highest paid employee is probably a football or basketball coach.
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BLOG: Medicaid
Medicaid expansion won't yield quality health care
The bombshell Oregon Medicaid study released this week should give all states pause as they consider plans to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. States must now ask what the point of Medicaid is in the first place.
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BLOG: Budget Gimmicks, Budget Processes and Systems, Measures to Balance Budgets, Spending, State Debt
Let's Put Privatizing Municipal Services Back on the Table
- View All Commentary
