Sen. Tom Hawk

Proposing a constitutional amendment requiring that a sheriff be elected in each county; exception. Against party

Increasing the criminal penalties for multiple thefts of mail; specifying that the crime of burglary includes, without authority, entering into or remaining within any locked or secured portion of any dwelling, building or other structure, with intent to commit another crime therein; providing guidance to determine how offenders under the supervision of two or more supervision agencies can have supervision consolidated into one agency; requiring an offender who raises error in such offender's criminal history calculation for the first time on appeal to show prejudicial error and authorizing the court to correct an illegal sentence while a direct appeal is pending; and transferring the responsibility to certify drug abuse treatment providers that participate in the certified drug abuse treatment program from the department of corrections to the Kansas sentencing commission.

Establishing the parents' bill of rights for parents of students attending elementary or secondary school in this state.

Providing considerations for in family law, adoption, foster care, guardianship and child in need of care proceedings for parents or prospective parents who are blind and updating the term "hearing impaired" to "hard of hearing" in statutes related to persons with hearing loss.

House Substitute for Substitute for SB 286 - Continuing the governmental response to the COVID-19 pandemic in Kansas by extending the expanded use of telemedicine, the suspension of certain requirements related to medical care facilities and immunity from civil liability for certain healthcare providers, certain persons conducting business in this state and covered facilities for COVID-19 claims until January 20, 2023, creating the crime of interference with the conduct of a hospital and increasing the criminal penalties for battery of a healthcare provider.

Expanding the pharmacist scope of practice to include initiation of therapy for certain conditions, updating provisions of the prescription monitoring program act relating to program data, storage and access and increasing the membership of the advisory committee.

Providing tax credits for graduates of aerospace and aviation-related educational programs and employers of program graduates, school and classroom supplies purchased by teachers, contributions to community colleges and technical colleges, qualified railroad track maintenance expenditures of short line railroads and associated rail siding owners or lessees and expanding eligibility, amount and transferability of the research and development tax credit, providing homestead property tax refunds from the income tax refund fund to certain persons based on the increase in property tax over the base year property tax amount, providing for an additional personal income tax exemption for 100% disabled veterans, establishing the salt parity act to allow pass-through entities to elect to pay state income tax at the entity level, establishing a checkoff for contributions to the Kansas historic site fund, establishing a revenue neutral rate complaint process for tax levies, authorizing the county clerk to limit the amount of ad valorem taxes to be levied in certain circumstances, establishing a deadline for budgets to be filed with the director of accounts and reports, requiring roll call votes and publication of information to exceed the revenue neutral rate, classifying certain agritourism activities and zoos as land devoted to agricultural use, classifying land devoted to agriculture that is subject to the federal grassland conservation reserve program as grassland, establishing a property tax exemption for antique utility trailers, allowing for the proration of value when certain personal property is acquired or sold prior to September 1 of any tax year, providing for the exemption of inventory and work-in-progress machinery and equipment for telecommunications machinery and equipment, increasing the extent of exemption for residential property from the statewide school levy, providing for abatement or credit of property tax for buildings and improvements destroyed or substantially destroyed by natural disaster, providing a sales tax exemption for certain fencing and for reconstructing, repairing or replacing certain fencing damaged or destroyed by a wildfire, flood, tornado or other natural disaster, excluding separately stated delivery charges from sales or selling price, removing the expiration on manufacturer cash rebates on motor vehicles, providing countywide retailers' sales tax authority for Wilson county, requiring disclosure of distribution of revenues on countywide retailers' sales tax ballot proposals, validating the election held to approve a retailers' sales tax levy by the city of Latham, extending the time period for eligibility in the loan repayment program and the income tax credit for rural opportunity zones, enacting the Gage park improvement authority act and providing for the creation of the Gage park improvement authority and an election for the imposition of a countywide sales tax sales tax within the boundaries of Shawnee county.

Revising laws relating to operating an aircraft under the influence, including prescribing criminal and administrative penalties and providing for testing of blood, breath, urine or other bodily substances, and preliminary screening tests of breath or oral fluid; authorizing reinstatement of a driver's license for certain persons with an ignition interlock device restriction; requiring persons with an ignition interlock device restriction to complete the ignition interlock device program before driving privileges are fully reinstated; providing for reduced ignition interlock device program costs for certain persons; providing that the highway patrol has oversight of state certification of ignition interlock manufacturers and their service providers; modifying the criminal penalties for driving a commercial motor vehicle under the influence and driving under the influence; increasing the period of disqualification for certain offenses committed by a person with commercial driving privileges; and prohibiting prosecuting attorneys from concealing certain traffic violations from the CDLIS driver report.

Senate Substitute for HB 2361 by Committee on Judiciary - Removing the requirement that all district court judges in Douglas county serve on the board of trustees of the law library, authorizing the supreme court to adopt rules establishing specialty court programs, creating the specialty court funding advisory committee and the specialty court resources fund, authorizing courts to order defendants to participate in specialty court programs and allowing expungement of certain convictions when defendants complete the requirements of such programs.

Requiring retention of fingerprints by the Kansas bureau of investigation for participation in the federal rap back program; imposing restrictions on surveillance by certain employees of the Kansas department of wildlife and parks on private property; expanding the jurisdiction and powers of law enforcement officers to include situations when an activity is observed leading the officer to reasonably suspect a person is committing, has committed or is about to commit a crime and reasonably believe that a person is in imminent danger of death or bodily injury without immediate action; allowing a search warrant to be executed within 240 hours from the time of issuance; and directing the Kansas department for children and families to share certain information with investigating law enforcement agencies.