6A = THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
NEWS
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2002
Candidate ready to increase school spending
Candidate says he will support education funding
The Associated Press
TOPEKA — Republican gubernatorial candidate Tim Shallenburger said yesterday he's receptive to large spending increases for public schools.
Shallenburger said he would set a goal of having the state spend an additional $400 million a year if legislators thought it necessary for a suitable education to each child.
He said the state might need several years to achieve such an increase.
The Republican nominee has said he won't cut education spending, despite the state's financial problems and his promise not to increase taxes.
He didn't offer specifics about where he would get the extra money.
Shallenburger has been critical of Democrat challenger Kathleen Sebelius for endorsing a consultant study that suggested the state needed to spend another $390 million a year on schools.
He had also questioned the need to hire outside consultants for a study as legislators did.
He said the state needed to conduct its own review, but yesterday he said the study was valuable.
Shallenburger spoke yesterday to about 100 superintendents and local school board members during a seminar sponsored by the Kansas Association of School Boards.
Later, Shallenburger told reporters he thought the state's
current aid, $3,863 per pupil, was reasonable and that, "I don't think we're off much" in providing a suitable education.
But he said legislators may have a different opinion, and they and his administration would have to agree on what constituted a suitable education.
"If the legislators who sit around that table tell me, 'We believe this is suitable and it's going to take us $400 million to fix it,' then that's the direction we'll move," Shallenburger said.
Sebelius addressed the same seminar separately, saying she favored giving school districts more authority to increase local property taxes while the state increased its education funding.
State law allows school district's spending to exceed the state aid it receives by up to 25 percent
"If the legislators who sit around that table tell me, 'We believe this is suitable and it's going to take us $400 million to fix it,' then that's the direction we'll move."
Tim Shallenburger
Republican gubernatorial candidate
if they increase local property taxes.
Sebelius said she would raise that limit to 30 percent.
"We really are in jeopardy of losing quality schools in this state," Sebelius said.
Sebelius resisted her support for the legislative study on school funding.
"Can we reach that goal in a year? No," she said, "I do think it's a reasonable goal to move in that direction."
As for Shallenburger's willingness to set such a goal, Sebellius spokeswoman Nicole Corcoran-Basso said, "That's interesting. He's obviously listening to Kathleen Sebellius."
Yesterday Shallenburger told superintendents and school board members that he had never criticized the study.
"I see it as very valuable," Shallenburger said. "That's the starting place."
Later, he was asked about a remark he made earlier yesterday at a fund raiser, when he said Kansas didn't need out-of-state consultants.
GEOLOGICAL SURVEY
PUBLISHES TWO ITEMS
300 million-year-old fossilized bivalves, brittle stars and sea anemones in Coffey County are the subject of a newbook, Ichnology of Pennsylvanian Equatorial Tidal Flat, from the Kansas Geological Survey. Also, a geologic map of Shawnee County has been reproduced by KGS cartographers.
FACILITIES MANAGER RETIRES FROM KU
A 27-year veteran of facilities management at KU announced his retirement Friday.
Rodger Oroke became director of facilities operations in 1976, became director of the Energy Saving Performance Contracting Program in 1999.
kansan.com