By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
A northeast Kansas legislator says lawmakers in Topeka need to tackle a handful of issues this legislative session.
State Rep. Allen Reavis, a Republican from Atchison, says Kansans need property tax relief.
“Whether that means recalculating how the appraisals are done; basically, make it more fair, more consistent, and try to lower the tax burden as far as property tax,” Reavis tells KFEQ/St. Joseph Post. “That’s the number one issue everybody’s been hearing.”
Reavis says the best way to tackle the problem hasn’t been resolved, yet. It could be how property is assessed or the legislature could look to cap property tax rates.
Reavis says Kansas legislators likely will place some issues before the voters next year, including a constitutional amendment to require someone has to be a U.S. citizen to vote in Kansas.
Reavis says the legislature also wants to place a check on state governmental agencies. Reavis claims current state law gives the bureaucracy too much power to shape Kansas policy.
“We’re one of only 11 states that don’t have legislative oversight on rules and regs,” according to Reavis. “So, we have a lot of problems with legislation by regulation, where the bureaucrats or these agencies are changing the rules or not quite following the intent of the legislature. That’s another one of the amendments that we’re going to have the voters vote on, where we have the authority to have legislative oversight to make sure they’re doing it the right way.”
Reavis expects the legislature to place the issue on the ballot next year.
Another issue the legislature might put to a public vote is how Supreme Court nominees are selected. At present, a panel of attorneys chooses the nominee. Reavis says that doesn’t work.
“We’re the only state in the country that has a panel of attorneys pick who the attorney that’ s going to become the state Supreme Court nominee is,” Reavis says, adding that the legislature likely will put before voters a choice: either keep the current system to have Supreme Court nominees elected by the public.
Reavis says the Kansas legislative session is off to a much faster start this legislative session. He credits a bipartisan team of legislative leaders which drafted a state budget so lawmakers could begin budget work as soon as they arrived in Topeka.
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