The Kansas Supreme Court ruled on May 27 that the state Legislature had failed to equitably fund public schools, giving the state until June 30 to fix its financing system or face a court-ordered shutdown of schools.

The House and Senate judiciary committees held a joint hearing on June 16 to discuss those issues in advance of a special legislative session to deal with the court order.

Most of the discussion centered on a plan to restore an equalization formula that had previously been held constitutional but that lawmakers repealed in 2015. Some lawmakers also vented their anger at the court, arguing that the justices had gotten the decision wrong and that the Legislature and the governor should simply ignore it.

A lawsuit from a coalition of school districts led the state Supreme Court to order the Legislature in 2014 to increase funding to poorer districts. The court and the Legislature have been at odds ever since. The court rejected the state’s most recent effort to address the inequity, saying the Legislature’s formula “creates intolerable, and simply unfair, wealth-based disparities among the districts.”

Lawrence Journal-World, June 16

The New York Times, May 27