Did BV-area senator Kellie Warren come up with parts of SB 40 to generate buzz prior to launching her campaign for KS Attorney General? Did Warren use Blue Valley students as political props, taking funds away from our kids’ classroom budgets to fight made-for-social media SB 40 battles - only for her pet provision to be ruled unconstitutional?
Here’s what Johnson County District Judge David Hauber had to say on Thursday:
“The Legislature’s attempt to promote “legal anarchy” in response to COVID-19 precautions in public schools is unconstitutional...It is difficult to fathom what the drafters of SB40 used as a legal template for this default provision, which seems to be unprecedented in the law.” https://kansasreflector.com/.../kansas-judge-strikes-down...
The Sunflower State Journal reported:
“Johnson County District Judge David Hauber ...criticized the law as a veiled attempt to give local governments more authority to address the pandemic while ensuring that they would face an onslaught of litigation from anyone opposing their efforts.
...The judge found that while the law was developed under the “guise of giving local governments the authority to address specific pandemic issues,” it actually “hobbled” their efforts by enacting legislation that would ensure lawsuits would be filed...
“Democratic state Rep. John Carmichael, a member of the conference committee that drew up the bill, agreed with the ruling. “It comes as no surprise to competent lawyers that the hastily drafted and passed emergency management bill, SB 40, is unconstitutional on its face,” Carmichael said in an email. “The Republican supermajorities in both houses knew full well SB 40 was one sided legislation designed to impose unreasonable and impossible time deadlines on both school boards and courts,” he said.”
(We got permission from the very informative, subscription-only publication Sunflower State Journal to provide the live link to this developing story. If you’re interested in deep-dives and up-to-the-minute info out of Topeka, it’s well worth a subscription.)
Significant district resources and dollars were drained away from our kids’ classrooms to repeatedly deal with SB 40 claims in the final weeks of school. Blue Valley was (and continues to be) in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. We’ve repeatedly called out local politicians like Warren for co-opting the pandemic for their own political gain. We can only imagine what’s coming next in this circus.
