title:  Kansas Governor Wants To Steal Money From State Investment Fund To Cover Budget Disaster He Caused
text: Kansas  economy is imploding, but rather than fix it by repealing his disastrous tax cuts, Governor Sam Brownback wants to raid the state investment fund instead.When Brownback gave a massive tax giveaway to big business and wealthy residents, he destroyed the state government s ability to generate revenues to pay for things like education, which has suffered greatly ever since.The budget shortfall is projected to stand at $930 million by 2018 and it just keeps getting bigger.Brownback and his Republican allies in the state legislature have been desperately trying to fill the massive gap by any means, including auctioning off sex toys and making deep education cuts.In other words, Kansas Republicans refuse to admit they made a mistake by slashing taxes the way they did and basically will do anything to fill the budget hole except reversing the tax cuts.A new idea Republicans have is to raid the state investment fund, which currently stands at over $300 million from money the state put aside to grow with investments in the stock market. This money is supposed to go toward paying for needs the state may have in the future.According to the Wichita Eagle,One source of money that the governor is eyeing is a long-term investment fund, according to Senate Majority Leader Jim Denning, R-Overland Park.Denning said the governor plans on using the roughly $360 million fund  to get out of the crisis  for the next six months  without having to do deep, deep cuts to K-12. The governor s on board and all the budget folks are on board,  Denning continued.  And all the legislators that have read about it   that I ve talked to   they re on board because they know that if we don t do this one-time money with such a short time frame left in fiscal year  17 that we d have to take almost that entire cut to K-12. There s no other place to go. You ve got to take your hat off that they ve looked under another sofa cushion and found another one-time solution. But this one, I think, is important, and I think all the legislators will support it. But that s not true. GOP state Senator Carolyn McGinn, who is the new chair of the Budget Committee, said the idea sounds like a shady pay-day loan. It looks to me like we re taking a payday loan,  she said.  We re borrowing against ourselves again internally, and I think it s just going to put us further away from where we need to get to. Indeed, Brownback and his GOP allies apparently think the only answer to fix their mess is to steal government money from other programs, including money from a tobacco settlement that funds children s programs. They re even considering doubling taxes on people who make under $30,000 a year which would squeeze low income families even more in a state that is waging war on food stamps.The state investment fund would only be a temporary fix for the current fiscal year because while it would close the current $350 million gap, an even bigger gap of $580 million would need to be plugged after July, when the next fiscal year begins. Plus, they would have to pay back the fund if they choose to pay it back at all, which would mean the people of Kansas lose that long-term investment into their state s future.In short, Republicans need to admit they screwed up and reverse Brownback s disastrous tax cuts for the wealthy and big business so they can get their fiscal house in order again without resorting to stealing money from children and the poor.Kansas Republicans should be embarrassed about the budget crisis they caused and they should rectify it by admitting that trickle-down economics do NOT work and reinstate the taxes that should never have been cut in the first place. It s time for big business and the wealthy to start paying their fair share again to save Kansas from utter financial ruin.Featured image via Win McNamee/Getty Images