The most recent letter from the incumbent representative for the 111th District of the Kansas House purports once again to separate fact from fiction. Once again, however, she uses misleading language and obfuscation to hide this fact: whatever interests she represents, they are not the interests of her district.
In the case of Medicaid expansion, almost her entire case is misleading. She begins by saying “I am not against the idea of Obamacare expansion,” which is a masterful exercise in misdirection but meaningless to the subject at hand. It confuses the issue and allows her to continue to hide her stance on it.
We are not talking about expanding Obamacare. We are talking about Medicaid expansion. We are also talking about a potential annual boost of $17.5 million to the district’s economy. My opponent has never – not once – talked about the economic aspect. She only talks about it costing too much.
Expansion would broaden Medicaid so that in Kansas, as in 38 other states, it is available to people above an extreme level of poverty. Under the current standard, an uninsured parent with two children who makes $4 an hour, or more than $8,500 a year, makes too much money to qualify.
She pretends that the only reason she has twice voted against it – she missed another vote – is because the measures did not meet her three conditions: a work requirement; adverse effects on the disabled; and a trigger if federal support falls below 90 percent of the cost of Medicaid expansion in the state.
Yet all of the proposals to expand Medicaid, which she voted against, met two of her three conditions. The one condition that wasn’t met? The work requirement.
The reason the work requirement was not included and has been ignored by other states that once included it, is because recent actions by U.S. Circuit Courts and the U.S. Supreme Court made work requirements useless. States that did establish such requirements have reversed course.
So the work requirement is essentially moot. She doesn’t know this, or doesn’t want you to know this.
Or, perhaps, it could also be the case that she just doesn’t care. Her special interest backers, such as the Kansas Chamber of Commerce, don’t want Medicaid expanded, so she won’t vote to expand.
The next issue is Fort Hays State University funding, and her supposed support for another of the largest economic engines in our district. Once again, her argument is misdirection. She cites a one-time expenditure of $5 million in Covid money – not state funding at all – to renovate Gross Memorial Coliseum.
What I have been talking about is basic state support for Fort Hays State University in the annual block grant, which is a major piece of the university’s budget. It is determined through a complicated formula.
My opponent misrepresents my position here just as she misrepresents her own.
According to the Kansas Board of Regents’ January 2022 State University Data Book, Fort Hays State’s FY 2020 grant was $39.43 million, after a calendar year in which FHSU served 18,827 students. By contrast, Wichita State served 19,010, and its block grant was $85 million.
My position is that FHSU’s annual block grant – based on students served – should be somewhere between $20 million and $30 million more.
That would be fair and equitable, and that is what I will advocate in the Kansas Legislature.
I am not, as my opponent likes to pretend, seeking the same block grant as Wichita State, which has costs that FHSU does not, including a highly regarded aviation program and a number of doctoral programs. I am not – NOT – seeking to cut WSU’s grant.
Fort Hays State’s block grant should be funded in an amount commensurate with our university’s value to the state and its citizens. That number is somewhere in the range of $20 million to $30 million more each year.
That is a fact.
Here’s another fact: The only advocate on the ballot this year for the 111th District is me.
On November 8, vote for Ed Hammond.
Dr. Ed Hammond, candidate for 111th Kansas House District