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TOPEKA — In a speech one spectator described as brief but dense, Gov. Sam Brownback on Wednesday gave his constitutionally mandated State of the State message to the Legislature.

The governor used fleeting phrases and 25 minutes to sketch a heavily weighted agenda that augurs a session potentially more complex than any since 1992, which was when lawmakers last rewrote the finance formula for public schools at the same time they redrew their own and federal legislative districts.

Both those agenda items are ones that historically have been politically fraught and difficult. He added to those a call to rewrite the state's tax and water-use policies and then threw in a makeover of the state's Medicaid program and reorganization of the state's social service agencies for added measure.

Ambitious agenda

It was the most ambitious legislative agenda put forth by a Kansas governor in a single session within recent memory, perhaps ever. And it was done with few flourishes or details by a conservative Republican just entering his second year occupying the executive suite of the Statehouse. The governor strayed only slightly from a script read from teleprompters in a packed House chamber that included the full Legislature and members of the supreme and appellate judiciary. His wife, Mary Brownback, tribal chiefs and other dignitaries observed from the galleries.

"There were several critical themes," Shannon Cotsoradis, chief executive of Kansas Action for Children, said of the speech. "It was pretty dense for being brief."

The script for Gov. Joan Finney's legislative message in 1992, which asked for $217 million in local property tax reductions and a new approach to education spending, ran to nine pages. Brownback's script was six pages — more in keeping with the lengths of the annual messages given by his immediate predecessors, Mark Parkinson and Kathleen Sebelius.

The details of his budget proposal for fiscal year 2013 are scheduled to be presented Thursday morning by Budget Director Steve Anderson to the House and Senate budget committees.

In his speech, the governor mentioned only that he wanted to end the year with a $465 million ending balance or cash reserve, which would exceed the 7.5 percent statutory requirement that the Legislature has routinely bypassed. He also said he wanted the Legislature to henceforth limit growth in state spending to no more than 2 percent with any additional revenue used to cut taxes.

That line later drew criticism from some moderate Republicans.

“If you limit new-revenue spending to 2 percent, you won’t have enough money to run the state,” said Senate Vice President John Vratil of Leawood. “Medicaid goes up more than 2 percent every year, KPERS (the state employee pension plan) goes up more than 2 percent, schools need additional funding every year, social services need new money. All of that exceeds 2 percent.”

But other legislators said they liked the sound of the idea.

“I think we’re headed in the right direction,” said Rep. Bob Brookens, a Marion Republican. “I think we need to know more about what it is that he’s proposing, but based on what he said tonight I’m hopeful. I like the idea of using our excess to pay down our debt.”

New tax laws

The governor called for a rewrite of tax laws so that Kansas income tax would have two tiers instead of three. The top rate would be 4.9 percent instead of 6.45 percent. The lower bracket would be reduced to 3 percent from 3.5 percent. The current middle rate of 6.25 percent for those with annual taxable income between $15,001 and $30,000 would be replaced by the 4.9 percent rate.

In a separate document released by administration officials but not cited in the speech, the governor proposed eliminating itemized deductions and a wide range of existing tax credits, including some that benefit business but also major ones helpful to lower-income families, including those for child and dependent care and the earned income tax credit.

Democrats, in their formal response to the governor's speech delivered by House Minority Leader Paul Davis of Lawrence, said they "cannot support a tax cut that makes the gap between the rich and the middle class even wider. We are particularly unwilling to support such a proposal while schools are limping along and other, more regressive taxes are driving Kansans into poverty."

"What you didn't hear in that tax proposal was what that means for children and families," Cotsoradis said, noting that elimination of the earned income tax credit "is one of the things we're most concerned about."

A bill introduced in the House last session would have phased out the earned income tax credit. It wasn't passed, but it alarmed advocates for the poor who said eliminating the credit would push another 6,500 Kansas families below the poverty line.

“That’s going to provoke a very bitter fight on both the House and the Senate floors,” Vratil predicted.

Medicaid

The governor said little new about the Medicaid makeover plan he initially made public at a Nov. 8 news conference.

He said his administration was "committed to a strong, effective safety net for our most vulnerable Kansans."

But he also said "Medicaid spending continues to skyrocket and it continues to place stress on funding for education, public safety and other essential services."

His Medicaid makeover plan, he said, would mean that every Medicaid recipient with a long-term disability would have "an integrated care coordinator."

And he said, "I propose Kansas be a national leader in helping the disabled find meaningful jobs."

“I heard the governor say that we will provide better care, better quality, not reduce services and at the same time figure out how to reduce our costs,” said Rep. Brenda Landwehr, a Wichita Republican who heads the House Health and Human Services Committee. “If we cannot get our costs under control, this state cannot prosper.”

Rep. Jerry Henry, a Cummings Democrat, said he was cautiously optimistic about the Medicaid makeover.

“Managed care is done by coordination — that’s what it is,” he said. “So after the governor released his Medicaid reform plan, a lot of families (of people with developmental disabilities) became concerned that any time they need assistance they were going to have to deal with someone on the other end of a 1-800 number behind a desk that’s somewhere out of state. What I heard the governor say tonight is that it’s his hope that the case-management system that we have now will remain in place. I welcome his saying that.”

Vratil, on the other hand, said he was skeptical the administration's plan would be able to improve the quality of Medicaid services and reduce costs without cutting provider payments.

“There’s an old saying: If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is,” Vratil said.

'Open for business'

Kent Beisner, chief executive of the Kansas Chamber, said the governor's speech, including the tax proposals, sent a "powerful message that Kansas is open for business."

But others expressed concern about an ambitious agenda presented with few details.

“Kansas is facing a major transformation with the redesign of Medicaid into KanCare," Cotsoradis said. "At the end of the day, the question will be: Can we deliver on the promises we’ve made in terms of this transition? There’s a lot ahead of us, and more than 230,000 Kansas children will be impacted by this transition.”

Henry expressed a similar concern, while noting that many of the governor's words would be well-received by voters in his district.

“What’s concerning to me is that there are so many big issues and so many different ways of doing things, but when you start looking for details, they aren’t there,” Henry said. “The people in my district like what he’s saying, they know things are going to have to change. But they want to know how it’s going to happen, and they want to know before it happens. They want details, which is what we don’t have yet. All we have so far is ‘Here’s starting point A, and Z is somewhere over there.’ We don’t know what’s in between.”