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WEDNESDAY • JUNE 3 • 2015
Citizens committee a no go for police plan
No stopping ‘march to zero’
By Chad Lawhorn Twitter: @clawhorn_ljw
Mike Yoder/Journal-World Photos
SEN. MARCI FRANCISCO, D-Lawrence, right, discusses tax issues with Sen. Jim Denning, R-Overland Park, Tuesday at the Statehouse in Topeka. Administration officials have said that all nonessential state workers would be furloughed if a budget deal is not reached by Sunday.
GOP lawmakers fret over speed of flight to income tax-free Kansas By Peter Hancock Twitter: @LJWpqhancock
2015 session
Topeka — Republicans Today is Day 104 in the Kansas Senate bePrevious record: gan warning Tuesday that 107 (set in 2002) if the state doesn’t halt, Taxes: Current or at least pause, the sotaxes leave roughly called “march to zero” a $400 million gap on income taxes, future between anticipated legislatures will face the spending and same kind of budget crirevenue. ses lawmakers are grapBudget: Planned pling with today. spending for schools The “march to zero” is a and judiciary passed. phrase coined by Republican Gov. Sam Brownback for his plan to gradually phase But the law also out income taxes contained provialtogether. It besions calling for gan in 2012 with tax rates to conpassage of a law tinue going down drastically cutin future years. ting income tax LEGISLATURE Now, even some rates overall and Republicans who eliminating income taxes supported the 2012 tax altogether for more than cuts say those future tax 330,000 business owners. cuts need to be slowed
Please see POLICE, page 8A
Associated Press
Topeka — The Kansas Senate made plans Tuesday to consider a roughly $400 million cut to state spending because of an impasse over a broader budget plan. Republican lawmakers control 129 of the Legislature’s 165 seats but remain sharply divided over how to address the state’s $800 million shortfall, with few willing to vote for significant tax increas-
Jenner reveal is a start toward acceptance, trans advocates say
SENATE MINORITY LEADER ANTHONY HENSLEY, D-Topeka, meets with Senate Minority Whip Laura Kelly, D-Topeka, and Sen. Tom Holland, D-Baldwin City, Tuesday on the floor of the Senate in Topeka. down, or even halted. “If we don’t do that, whoever is here is going to face the same thing we’re facing this year, over and over and over again,” Sen. Les Donovan, chairman of the Senate’s tax com-
es. Although a budget the Senate passed in late March would cut in half the gap for the fiscal year beginning July 1, it has not yet been approved by the House and has remained in negotiations between leaders from each chamber. Tax packages that would make up the remaining $406 million have been largely blocked by conservatives in the Senate who say the budget should be fixed by spending cuts instead. So the chamber will now consider a plan
By Caitlin Doornbos
mittee, told his colleagues in a Republican caucus meeting Tuesday. Under current law, individuals in Kansas pay 2.7 percent tax on the first Please see ZERO, page 2A
that would close the gap through a 5.7 percent across-the-board cut to all state agencies and schools. Sen. Laura Kelly, a Topeka Democrat, who serves as the ranking Democrat on the Senate Please see CUTS, page 2A l Tuesday, GOP lawmakers
found a little common ground on tax proposals to help balance the budget. 5A
Twitter: @CaitlinDoornbos
When former tennis star Renee Richards, who had undergone gender reassignment surgery in 1975, won the right to play as a woman in the U.S. Open in 1977, then 20-year-old Steven Michael Mott, who was raised in Eudora, thought for the first time that he could become his “authentic self”: a woman. Mott, 57, is Living now Stepha- as another nie Michelle — a feat she person is likens to “be- effectively ing free to suffocating breathe” after 48 years your soul.” of living as a man when — Stephanie Michelle Mott, Topeka she knew in her heart she was a woman. “Living as another person is effectively suffocating your soul,” Mott, of Topeka, said. “It’s like living in literally what a closet is: a place without sunshine.” Mott said she hopes former Olympian and “Keeping Up with the Kardashians”
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Spending cuts on table as stalemate drags on By Nicholas Clayton
A majority of city commissioners rejected the idea of creating an ad hoc committee to study issues surrounding a proposal to build a multimillion dollar police headquarters, instead vowing to tackle the divisive issue themselves. “The group that needs to solve this once and for all is us,” Mayor Jeremy Farmer said. “And we need to do it as a team.” Commissioners all agreed to work together, but were of different minds on the value of a citizens committee that could provide recommendations to City Hall. The ad hoc committee was recommended by Commissioner Stuart Boley. He and Commissioner Leslie Soden both exCITY COMMISSION pressed support for creating the committee. Farmer and Commissioners Mike Amyx and Matthew Herbert all expressed concerns about the committee. Boley ultimately withdrew the idea, sparing commissioners from taking a vote on the issue. There had been concern that an ad hoc committee would delay the process of moving forward on a police headquarters project. Boley had suggested giving the group until mid-November to deliver recommendations to the City Commission. That is well past the commission’s August deadline for creating a 2016 budget. Commissioners heard more than an hour’s worth of public comment on the
Please see JENNER, page 2A
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Kinedyne closing A longtime Lawrence manufacturer will close its production center in the East Hills Business Park later this year. Page 3A
Vol.157/No.154 22 pages