KANSAS CITY- A Kansas man was injured in an accident just after 12-noon on Thursday in Wyandotte County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2010 Chevy Impala driven by Hafizu U. Cheema, 29, Overland Park, was eastbound on Interstate 70 at 18th street.

The vehicle hydroplaned and struck the barrier wall.

Cheema was transported to KU Medical Center.

The KHP reported he was properly restrained at the time of the accident.

By Jim McLean
KHI News Service

A $21 million shortfall in September tax collections has renewed the debate on Gov. Sam Brownback’s economic policies heading into the last month of the 2014 campaign.

Over the last five months, tax receipts have fallen more than $360 million short of official projections, driven largely by the 26 percent reduction in income tax rates championed by Brownback and passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature in 2012 and 2013.

The continuing shortfalls are forcing the state to spend through its reserves, a strategy that analysts in the nonpartisan Kansas Legislative Research Department say could put the state nearly $240 million in the red by July of 2016.

Paul Davis, Brownback’s Democratic challenger, used the September revenue report to launch another attack on what he calls the governor’s “failed policies.”
“The governor’s economic experiment isn’t working, and it’s not going to work,” Davis said in a campaign news release. “It is damaging our schools, hurting our economy and putting our children’s future in jeopardy.”

Brownback and others in the administration insist that the drop in revenue is temporary and that the tax cuts will transform the Kansas economy if given enough time to work.

Shawn Sullivan, director of the governor’s budget office, said small business owners whose taxes were eliminated by the cuts are telling him they eventually will use the money they’re saving to create new jobs.

“What they tell me is, ‘These tax cuts and these policy changes take time (to work),’” Sullivan said. “These tax policy changes aren’t like you flip a switch and you have 100,000 new jobs. It’s trying to set the environment right for small businesses that employ the majority of Kansans.”

Kansas is doing well compared to neighboring states when it comes to job growth in the small business sector, Sullivan said.

Revenue Secretary Nick Jordan points to the $21.5 million collected above the September estimate in corporate income taxes as an indication of the state’s improving business climate. But critics say the corporate tax windfall was more than offset by a $42.4 shortfall in individual income tax receipts.

Broader measures reported by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics still show the state lagging the region and nation in job growth.

To head off possible budget cuts, Sullivan said the administration is implementing “efficiencies” that he estimates can save $101 million by the end of the 2015 budget year.

Eventually, Sullivan said, he expects that taxes paid by Kansans hired to fill the new jobs created by the governor’s tax policies will restore state revenues to pre-cut levels.

But Duane Goossen, a former budget director who worked for both Republican and Democratic governors, said that is wishful thinking.

“It seems almost impossible to think given our current tax structure that increased economic activity could replace the losses that have occurred,” Goossen said.

Neither the governor nor anyone in his administration has been able to show precisely how the job growth they’re hoping for will restore the lost revenue, Goossen said.

“In fact, the opposite is true,” he said. “The Kansas Legislative Research Department has been predicting and forecasting all along that with these tax changes revenue would drop dramatically, and it has.”

ALAN FRAM, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Gun control groups say they plan to spend tens of millions of dollars this fall to help congressional candidates backing firearms curbs.

That means their campaign spending could finally match the National Rifle Association’s after years of being drubbed by the gun lobby.

Yet gun control groups’ long awaited parity with the NRA comes at a time when firearms violence is not a top public concern. That’s a turnabout from the months following the December 2012 massacre of 20 first-graders plus six elementary school aides in Newtown, Conn.

Both sides in the gun debate plan heavy campaign spending over the next few weeks anyway. That’s because there are many close races where a few votes could matter — especially in the Senate, which each party hopes to control next year.

A severe thunderstorm pounded portions of Mitchell and other counties in North central Kansas early Thursday morning.

According to information from the National Weather Service in Hastings, golf ball size hail broke windows on the south side of homes 3 to 8 miles south of Beloit about 6:35 a.m. Thursday morning.

Officials also report crops destroyed due to a combination of hail and wind southeast of Beloit.

The Mitchell County Sheriff’s Office estimated winds of 90-mph caused significant damage to a home, and destroyed a farm Quonset about a mile south of Asherville around 6:40 a.m.

As the storm moved east and northeast, it dropped ping pong ball size hail south of Concordia, and hail covered the ground in portions of Washington and Marshall counties, and wide spread tree damage was also reported in Frankfort due to high winds.

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A new report says sexual offenses reported last year on the Kansas University campus increased by 10 from the previous year.

The Lawrence Journal-World reports there were 13 reported sex offenses in 2013. In 2012, there were three, and in 2011, there were two. The numbers come from incidents reported to the college’s Public Safety Office, student affairs office and the Department of Student Housing.

The federal Clery Act requires colleges to report their crime statistics and submit them to the U.S. Department of Education.

On Wednesday, the school placed the Kappa Sigma fraternity on interim suspension, after receiving reports of a sexual assault during a fraternity party over the weekend. The national organization’s executive director says they’re investigating the matter and have also suspended the local chapter for the time being.