TOPEKA, Kan.—Already frustrated by Kansas frequently overshooting how much money the state will bring in month to month, state Sen. Jim Denning was anything but comforted by fellow Republican Gov. Sam Brownback’s latest budget plan and the widening gap it looks to fill.
Unveiled Wednesday to the Republican-dominated Legislature, the spending blueprint for the fiscal year that begins in July projects a $190 million hole—something Brownback believes can be patched by such things as juggling state funds and selling off assets of a soon-to-be-privatized state agency.
It isn’t a unique crisis—Illinois’ budget gap is said to be anywhere from $5 billion to $8 billion and Oklahoma is at about $900 million for the coming fiscal year.
Kansas’ budget woes began after the Legislature got on board with Brownback’s plan to slash personal income taxes in 2012 and 2013 in hopes of stoking the economy. But in this election year, discontent among Kansas lawmakers, some of whom voted for those tax cuts, isn’t hard to find.
“I’m not comfortable with the present situation,” Denning, the second in command of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, told The Associated Press after a hearing in which state budget director Shawn Sullivan outlined Brownback’s fiscal recommendations. “We’re walking a tightrope without a safety net.”
