Posts Tagged ‘Kansas’

From LJWorld.com:

Secretary of State Kris Kobach said Wednesday he will renew a push next year to move up the start date for new Kansas voter identification laws.

Kobach said he would like to have people registering to vote for the first time in Kansas show proof of citizenship starting in March 2012, not January 2013 as the law now requires. He spoke before a meeting of a task force working on implementing the new law.

The secretary of state said the goal was to prevent any non-U.S. citizens from registering to vote in Kansas and spoiling the integrity of the state’s elections. The sooner Kansas can begin verifying citizenship, the more secure the elections will be, he argues.

“That’s really the main legislative change I would like to see,” the Republican said. “That way, the bulk of the registrations in the 2012 cycle will be properly analyzed for citizenship.”

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Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach pens a column that appeared in the Wall Street Journal today.

From WSJ.com:

On Thursday, the Wisconsin legislature sent a bill requiring photographic identification for voting to Gov. Scott Walker’s desk. This follows the enactment of an even stricter law in Kansas a few weeks ago.

Drafted by my office, Kansas’s Secure and Fair Elections Act combined three elements: (1) a requirement that voters present photo IDs when they vote in person; (2) a requirement that absentee voters present a full driver’s license number and have their signatures verified; and (3) a proof of citizenship requirement for all newly registered voters. Although a few states, including Georgia, Indiana and Arizona, have enacted one or two of these reforms, Kansas is the only state to enact all three.

Other states are moving in the same direction. The Texas legislature sent a photo-ID bill to Gov. Rick Perry’s desk last Monday. And next year Missouri voters will get a chance to vote on a photo-ID requirement.

Immediately after the Kansas law was signed in April, critics cried foul. They argued that voter fraud isn’t significant enough to warrant such steps, that large numbers of Americans don’t possess photo IDs, and that such laws will depress turnout among the poor and among minorities. They are wrong on all three counts.

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From Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach:

Governor Sam Brownback signed HB 2240 on May 12, 2011, a bill my office advocated to improve oversight of cemetery trust funds for the benefit of Kansans. The secretary of state’s office has a statutory duty to audit certain cemetery corporation trust funds to confirm that they are financially able to meet required obligations to purchasers over time.

A cemetery must sustain a permanent maintenance trust fund to generate income in order to maintain the cemetery in perpetuity. Otherwise, bankrupt cemeteries go unmaintained, degrading communities and dishonoring those buried there. For those who purchase cemetery merchandise or services before they are needed, cemeteries must keep sufficient funds in a merchandise trust fund to cover the cost of such goods or services at the time of need.

Because of several instances where cemeteries have not complied with the law, we formed a Cemetery Study Group to evaluate the industry and how the law could be improved. Members were cemetery owners, cemetery trustees, industry experts, the Kansas Bankers Association, the attorney general’s office and the secretary of state’s office. The group set the following goals: (1) to secure the statutory trust funds but still allow the cemeteries to generate reasonable income; (2) to give the secretary of state’s office the ability to respond to irregularities quickly and fairly; and (3) to create an efficient but not overly burdensome method of auditing the trust funds.

The result of the Cemetery Study Group’s efforts was HB 2240, one of the biggest overhauls of cemetery laws in the country and a model for other states to consider. This law offers three benefits. First, it gives consumers better assurance that when their loved ones are laid to rest the cemetery lawn will continue to be mowed, and that the headstone they pre-purchased will be provided at the time of need because the cemetery has sufficient funds in trust. Second, this law protects the reputation of good cemeteries that may be damaged by the illegal actions of a few. And third, it enables regulators to monitor cemetery activity more effectively and efficiently.

I call that a win-win-win.

From the Wichita Eagle:

A few dozen Kansans were treated to what was perhaps the most exciting secretary of state debate in state history Tuesday night.

The secretary of state’s race seldom attracts much interest in election years. This year, however, is a little different, thanks to the issue of voter fraud.

Republican Kris Kobach and Democratic incumbent Chris Biggs clashed over that, as well as voter identification law and even how they would spend their spare time if elected.

Kobach argued that election fraud poses a significant threat to the state’s voting system. Kobach said hundreds or even thousands of illegal immigrants could be casting ballots and canceling out the votes of Kansas residents.

“I would say that one case of voter fraud is too many in Kansas,” said Kobach, a constitutional law professor on leave from the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Kobach previously worked for the U.S. Department of Justice and led the state’s Republican Party.

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