Governor Kelly waiting on conference committees, confident education bill will be ‘a whole lot like’ her proposal

As the conference committee responsible for putting together the inflation adjustment for K-12 funding has been named, Kansas Governor Laura Kelly waits on the results of that process.

“I think the cleanest, easiest, most sure way of doing business would be to have whatever comes out of conference look a whole lot like the Senate bill which was a whole lot like the plan that I presented at the beginning of the session,” Kelly said. “It replicates what the State Board of Education recommended.”

Kelly’s still looking to solve the litigation and not to complicate the issue.

“We are confident that meets the court’s demand that we account for inflation and would be the vehicle out of litigation,” said Kelly. “I think when all is said and done in conference, we’ll end up with something that looks very much like that and eliminates some of the policy that was put into the House version.”

Kelly doesn’t think the Court would look favorably on all the policy that came out of the House.

“It would probably be ruled unconstitutional, because it creates some inequities, and probably some inadequacies,” said Kelly. “When it’s all said and done, it will look a lot like Senate Bill 142.”

Kelly isn’t surprised that not much has come across her desk thus far in the session.

“I know how this works,” said Kelly. “I’m pleased that they actually were able to get a couple of significant items taken care of. It’s not unusual for the big stuff to come up in the veto session after the Legislature comes back after the April break. This is how it generally works. I’m just going with the flow.”

The Legislature is scheduled to take its break in early April.