TOPEKA — The Kansas Senate supports a 50% increase in lump-sum death benefits for Kansas Public Employees Retirement System retirees and an increase to 20% of the maximum amount of pension plan portfolios tied to alternative private equity and infrastructure investments. It was decided to do so.
Although senators were divided on the fiscal impact of both changes, they voted 25-14 in favor of Senate Bill 172, which would increase the death benefit from the current $4,000 to $6,000. The adjustment amount will be paid from KPERS contributions and investment income. The cost over 20 years could cost him $108 million.
“This hasn’t changed in 30 years, since 1993,” said Sen. Rick Billinger, a Goodland Republican and chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee. “I know some people are concerned about us taking $108 million and adding it to our unfunded liability.”
He asked senators to consider that KPERS has $27 billion in assets and had an 11% return on investment last year. KPERS’ long-term unfunded actuarial liability, the difference between trust fund assets and expected future benefits, was $9.6 billion as of July 2023.
“Increasing the unfunded liability is not a first move, in my opinion,” said Sen. Jeff Longbein, R-Emporia, who agreed that increasing the death benefit is premature. “We’ve worked hard to get back on track. We still have a long way to go.”
Sen. Pat Petty, a Democrat from Kansas City, Kansas, said Congress should authorize the benefit adjustments. She said the lack of increases in decades means increasing the payment to $6,000 would still fall short of funeral costs.
investment portfolio
Meanwhile, the Senate voted 24-13 to send Senate Bill 23, which would increase the cap on KPERS alternative investments from 15% to 20% of total pension plan assets, to the Kansas House.
The bill’s original purpose was to remove the investment cap and let the KPERS board decide what to do with that portion of the portfolio, but the bill simply increases the cap to 20% of the portfolio. A compromise was reached.
Sen. Mark Steffen, R-Reno County, argued that some members of the Senate lack investment knowledge and said, “Buyer beware.” “I feel like there’s been a lot of lipstick put on when it comes to alternative investments. They’re essentially about swinging for the fences.”
KPERS Executive Director Alan Conroy said that due to investment market volatility, KPERS’ alternative investment portfolio rose to 14.1% and then settled at 13%. Congress adopted a 10% cap in 1992 and raised it to 15% in 1993.
“If KPERS reaches the 15% alternative investment cap under current law, new investments in private equity and infrastructure will be halted and will not be able to resume until exposure falls below the cap,” he said. “This could limit KPERS’ ability to diversify these investments over the economic cycle, increasing risk and potentially resulting in KPERS losing access to top-tier investment managers and potentially reducing returns. there is.”
Handling of pornography
Leawood Sen. Kelly Warren, Republican chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, unanimously approved a bill that would require websites that display pornography to use commercial-grade age verification software and block users under 18. persuaded legislators to do so.
Under Senate Bill 394, a website is subject to age verification requirements if one-quarter or more of the content viewed in a calendar month could be construed as harmful to minors. Internet service providers in Kansas would not be subject to the bill’s obligations.
“We hear a lot about the harms of becoming addicted to watching pornography,” Warren says.
She heard from Democratic senators whether Attorney General Kris Kobach would use the bill to attack websites specializing in literature and the arts, and whether authentication systems could expose personal information about adults to hackers. I was asked if there was one.
Sen. Tom Holland, D-Baldwin City, asked whether the annual Sports Illustrated swimsuit photo edition posted online could be defined as pornography under the proposed website crackdown.
“Can you say it’s fundamentally harmful to minors? Can’t you make a case that it’s sexually arousing?” Holland said.
Warren told senators that content harmful to minors is defined as content that includes descriptions, displays, presentations, or expressions of nudity, sexual activity, sexual arousal, or sadomasochistic abuse. It cited existing Kansas law. He said the responsibility for investigating public reports of violations of the law rests with the attorney general and that courts will make decisions based on that evidence.
The Attorney General would be allowed to charge websites a civil penalty of $500 to $10,000 for each visit to a violative website by a minor. Parents or guardians of minors who accessed pornography on certain websites would be allowed to sue and seek damages of at least $50,000.
“This bill is carefully tailored to avoid violating First Amendment concerns,” Warren said.
“Are we talking about things like ‘Mrs. ”, he suggested.
Sen. Lenny Erickson (R-Wichita) said the bill was written to impose age restrictions on pornography on websites, similar to the ratings used for movie admission.
“I’m a little confused by the questions on this,” she said. “If it’s not age appropriate, it shouldn’t be shown to children.”
Passenger rail expansion
Sen. Carolyn McGinn, a Republican from the Sedgwick area, has introduced a bill that would require the state to invest $50 million over 10 years to expand passenger rail service in Kansas through a partnership between the Kansas Department of Transportation and the federal government. succeeded in. . The Senate voted 34-6 to send Senate Bill 349 to the House.
McGinn said the Heartland Flyer corridor, which was decommissioned in 1979, could be brought back into service by Amtrak and extended from Fort Worth, Texas, to Oklahoma City, Wichita and Newton. In addition to stops in Edmond, Perry, and Ponca City, Oklahoma, there are also stops in Arkansas City, Wichita, and Newton. This will connect rail passengers to the Southwest Chief, which currently runs from Los Angeles to Chicago.
Last month, the Federal Railroad Association awarded up to $500,000 to develop the Heartland Flyer project. This helped the extension win $1.8 billion in U.S. rail corridor subsidies.
“Now is the time to partner with Amtrak and the federal government to launch this service and then start preparing for how we will continue this service in the future,” she said.
The bill would allow KDOT to allocate state funds through 2035 to Amtrak and other Federal Railroad Administration-approved rail service projects and operations. It was hoped that federal funding could be secured to cover the first five years of passenger rail. It expanded in Kansas and was later funded by the state.
