Thursday, January 16, 2003
The Governor gave her 2004
Budget message last night and to our great surprise restored many of the SRS
cuts that had been made. She took money from cities and counties and from
Transportation and put it back into programs, while keeping education from
receiving and cuts.
We are thrilled that this Governor put her priorities on Kansas People and not
asphalt at a time when we are in a staggering economic shortfall!
We still have to sort out the details of the budget and Janet Schalansky will
be meeting with us next week to give details. As soon as we know, we'll
pass them on to you but it appears many of the onerous cuts to children and
adult services will be restored, if her budget is the one the legislature
approves.
But we must keep two things in mind.
1. This is not a done deal. We will have to work VERY hard to ensure that this
budget gets passed by the legislature. It would not be inappropriate to
contact legislators and let them know how you feel about restoring cuts to the
SRS and Aging budgets.
2. The cuts will occur for the remainder of this fiscal year (until July 30th,
2003), at least as far as we know right now.
Please remember to thank Gov. Sebelius for her courage and for keeping her
promises to us!
More to come
"In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the
silence of our friends." - Martin Luther King Jr