28 March 2025 | Education & Early Learning Tax and Budget Economic Security Health

2025 Statehouse Snapshot: Week 11

Kansas Action for Children | March 28, 2025

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Legislature Adjourns for Its Short Break

Just before midnight last night, the House closed out the regular portion of the 2025 session. As is typical, this last week of legislative action was filled with back-room deals, last-minute plans, and unfinished business.

What strikes us most, as we begin to wrap up this year’s policy work, is the strong hold party politics has within the Statehouse. As you’ll see throughout the rest of this week’s summary, many bills received more votes than required to sustain any vetoes of the Governor.

It’s a reminder of the environment we’re in – and the groundwork we must continue laying in the months to come.

Thank you for continuing with us this session. Staying informed on what’s really happening in the Statehouse is important to being able to influence the right decision makers at the right time.

We’ll send our next Statehouse Snapshot just before they come back for Veto Session on April 10. If there are any opportunities for you to contact your lawmaker in anticipation of what the Legislature has in store for Veto Session, we’ll make those available.

A Budget with Mixed Messages

The state budget that now is on its way to the Governor is not a fiscally conservative budget. Instead, it’s a representation of the influence certain powerful constituencies can exert to get what they want. We never heard budget leaders publicly acknowledge or consider how the state’s budget could address the realities of Kansas families struggling with the rising costs of rent, child care, health care, and groceries.

After months of work on the budget, it’s clear many lawmakers were dissatisfied with the final version, which you can especially see reflected in the Senate vote. It’s true that state expenses are higher than the tax revenue coming into the state. Both political parties agree that something needs to be done about growing costs. But for all the posturing about cutting expenses, somehow special interest funding still manages to be prioritized by a few lawmakers, leaving us to wonder what lies ahead in the years to come when a real budget crisis can no longer be ignored.

Very targeted priorities received funding, such as a costly AI-gun-detection system for schools, duplicative fraud monitoring, and state investments for drone technology. Lawmakers made sure those projects of personal interest were prioritized, but then made ill-informed decisions that carelessly cut K-12 public education funding, adequate resources for constitutionally-required legal representation for Kansans, and a 1.5% broad operational cut to most state agencies.

And as you’ll read in this same newsletter, the tax changes that were passed (on the same day as the budget!) will more than likely wipe out any savings from the $210.5 million lawmakers cut from next year’s budget.

This year’s budget process was a big change from prior years – but our final analysis is that the changes weren’t for the better.

House Balks at Property Tax Overhaul, but Both Chambers Welcome Flat Tax

Conference committee week has reached its end and so have major proposals to cut state income and property taxes. The week started out strong, with negotiations between the House and Senate tax committee leaders producing four mostly agreed upon bills. As the week progressed, the Legislature appeared poised to make financially devastating cuts to state property taxes. And then it all fell apart.

On Wednesday, in a shocking 26-14 vote, Senate Sub. for HCR 5011 – proposing a constitutional amendment changing the way properties are valued for taxes – failed in the Senate before ultimately passing after a “no” vote flipped to “yes” the next day. Unfortunately for HCR 5011, it still had to go to the House, where it died in a stunning rejection of bad policy that would have blown up the state’s budget and jeopardized education funding.

Had this bill passed the House and been approved by voters next August, it would have cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars in lost revenue to the statewide school finance mill levy. The valuation cap was a top priority for the Senate. So after the House vote, there were few options left to provide property tax relief. The only one that both chambers agreed on was SB 35, which eliminates the 1.5-mill educational building fund levy. This will amount to savings of $25.88 for a homeowner living in a $150,000 house but will cost the state $60 million in the first year alone. Still expensive and far from the relief constituents are demanding, but not nearly as devastating as other proposals.

Since they were unable to get their drastic tax cut in HCR 5011, the Legislature turned to their favorite target: income taxes. SB 269 was the only other tax bill to clear both chambers and sets Kansas on the path to a flat tax when Kansas revenues are in the black. While it may take years to reduce rates using the stair-step method chosen by the Legislature, this bill limits the state’s ability to cut other taxes, likes sales and property taxes. With a veto-proof majority of votes, this bill seems like it’s easily on its way to becoming law.

SB 269, coupled with some budget decisions, are causing us to worry about the future impact to the state budget and corresponding cuts to K-12 funding or family support programs that many rely on. In future years, we will be watching for fiscal consequences.

Conference Committee Runs out of Time to Work through Child Care Bill

Sub. for HB 2294, the child care bill that also includes dangerous deregulation language and cements child care vaccination exemptions in state law, has stalled (for now). While a last-minute conference committee attempted to work out differences on the bill yesterday evening, no real progress was made. Because the Senate had already adjourned and any compromise seemed to be far off, conference committee members stated their intent to reconvene the discussion during Veto Session on April 10.

It’s important to note that the Senate has not held a hearing on the bill, so most of the provisions in Sub. for HB 2294 haven’t been properly vetted by that chamber. We believe legislation directing the safety of our state’s littlest kids should be handled with the most scrutiny, and the concerning parts of this bill should be given another look and removed from the bill before it moves forward.

Legislature Power Grabs Public Assistance Program Waiver Approval

We started the week hopeful that a permanent fix for a long-standing CHIP eligibility error in state law was finally in sight as part of House Sub. for SB 126, which had been sent to conference committee. Unfortunately, due to sudden Senate-side concerns about the overall CHIP program and to save the Newborn Screening Program updates plus other provisions, the CHIP eligibility fix part was removed.

While we are disappointed a permanent CHIP fix couldn’t cross the finish line, we’re grateful the rest of the bill passed overwhelmingly in both chambers. Now, the CHIP fix issue seems likely to be studied before the 2026 session convenes to alleviate some concern that some senators had.

The budget yet again includes a proviso to temporarily fix the main issue with CHIP eligibility for another year, so the loss of this permanent fix will not impact Kansas kids for at least this coming fiscal year.

After a few tweaks in conference committee, lawmakers passed Senate Sub. for HB 2240, which would restrict state agencies’ authority to make certain changes to public assistance programs without legislative approval. We continue to have serious concerns that this legislation implements additional layers of bureaucracy and will result in delayed responses, lack of innovation, and threats to federal funding. We will be curious to see if the Governor vetoes this bill. Due to the vote margins in both chambers, we expect a veto to be easily overridden, however.

Measles in Kansas

Kansas made national headlines this week, as the official state report for measles cases climbed to 23 in six southwest Kansas counties, more than doubling the case count from only a week ago. Every Wednesday now, KDHE will update their measles outbreak tracker. Case counts continue to rise around the country; as of yesterday, 483 cases were reported in 19 states, according to the CDC. Our partner, the Immunize Kansas Coalition, provides helpful information about the measles vaccine, as wide community coverage is the best protection against measles spreading any further. Contact your local health department or medical provider to learn more.

Several Bills Limiting Access to Support Programs Fail to Move Forward

Throughout the legislative session, we have been talking about lawmakers attacking family support programs under the mythical guise of waste, fraud, and abuse. Despite the common rhetoric in the Statehouse, we were able to successfully stave off many of those attacks.

The session started with a lot of momentum toward eliminating the Affordable Housing Tax Credit (AHTC) program, which has led to thousands of affordable homes being built over the past couple of years. The House rammed through HB 2119 last month to eliminate the program, despite there being 39 opponents and no proponents during the hearing, but then things began to stall out. The Senate Commerce Committee listened to the concerns of their constituents and amended the bill to reduce the price tag of the program instead of eliminating it, but then it never moved forward to the full Senate for a vote.

The House and Senate Commerce Committees met several times this week to try to find a compromise on HB 2119, but neither chamber was willing to accept the other’s position, and the week ended without a bill to send to the floor. We may see them work this during Veto Session, since the House has a strong desire to reduce or eliminate the program. But with the Senate seemingly holding firm on keeping a more modest version of the program, another shot at negotiations could end in the same result.

SB 85 was an expensive solution lawmakers were considering to kick more Kansans off of safety net programs. It would have required 100+ additional state employees and extensive technology updates to constantly monitor recipients of assistance programs and redetermine their eligibility as their lives evolved, their income fluctuated, or even if they made a purchase on the wrong side of the state line. It seemed the momentum for this was waning later in the session, and that was confirmed when it didn’t reappear this week.

SB 254 is another bill we were closely watching, and we were happy to see it not get brought back up. This bill would have prohibited undocumented immigrants from accessing public benefits (like in-state tuition). It also would have created a two-tiered legal system that erodes due process for undocumented Kansans who have been charged with, but not convicted of, a crime.

We weren’t able to prevent all the attacks on low-income Kansas families this year, but it was refreshing to see the focus shift away from some of the worst ideas during this last week of the regular session. With these bills still in play next session, we will continue researching what impacts they could have and keep them on our radar.

Veto Watch

The Legislature is set to return April 10 and 11 for Veto Session, at which time lawmakers will finish any business and attempt to override the Governor’s vetoes. As a reminder, the Governor has 10 calendar days from the time a bill is sent to her to sign the bill, veto the bill, or let it become law without her signature.

Here are some of the bills we’re watching that could receive a veto:

SB 269, the flat income tax bill that would divert millions in surplus funds toward the highest-income Kansans and corporations.
SB 79, the candy/soda ban for SNAP recipients.
HB 2217, which would expand the authority of the Medicaid Inspector General to include fraud investigation for SNAP and TANF recipients.
HB 2101, which bans municipalities from implementing guaranteed income programs.
Senate Sub. for HB 2240, which would require the Legislature to approve some program waivers as it pertains to public assistance programs, like Medicaid, SNAP, and TANF.
Sub. for SB 29, which would remove the authority of the state to ban public gatherings in light of disease outbreaks.
SB 14, which would continue the state’s prior year budget if a new budget does not become law.

KAC will be taking a break from the Statehouse Snapshot next Friday, but we’ll still be hard at work preparing for what’s in store April 10-11! We’ll give you a quick Veto Session preview before then.