SHL News Release on Elections and Issues

SHL HOLDS MID-SUMMER ISSUES MEETING

The Executive Board of the Silver Haired Legislature held their mid-summer issues meeting on
Wednesday, July 27th, 2022 in Junction City, Kansas. These issues will be presented to the full
membership of the Silver Haired Legislature at their Annual Session October 2022.

The Executive Board is composed of the SHL chairperson from each of the eleven PSA districts across the state of Kansas, plus the officers of the overall membership of the organization. These include the Speaker, Speaker Pro Tem, and the Floor Leader. Randall Hardy, Saline County SHL representative who is the SHL Speaker, and Jay Rowh, Mitchell County SHL representative who is the Speaker Pro Tem and the Floor Leader, chaired the meeting.

In the spring and early summer, the SHL (Silver Haired Legislature) members within each of
the PSA(Planning Service Area) local districts meet to decide what issues are important to senior citizens in their district. The issues are the result of direct interaction with the constituents of that PSA. There are 11 PSA’s that cover all 105 counties in the State of Kansas. Those issues are then brought to the Executive Board Issues meeting during their July Board meeting for their consideration, where those issues are discussed, debated, and whittled down to a select few predicated on several factors such as; urgency, service for the majority, and existing legislations. The issues that were shared with that local PSA and did not receive consideration at the Annual Session, remain an active concern for that PSA as well as the entire SHL. ALL ISSUES MATTER! The resulting finalists selected during their July planning session will subsequently be presented to the entire SHL membership for their consideration at their Annual Session in Topeka currently slated for this October 4-6, 2022 (Tuesday –
Thursday). To ensure that the issues are correct and suitable for consideration those finalists are reviewed and vetted by a third party known as “The Office of Revisor of Statutes”.

A total of 52 local issues in 35 general issues were initially brought to the Executive Board.
From this list, a total of six issues were selected to be presented to the full membership in October. During the SHL Annual Session those six issues will go through a three-step process to ascertain the approval of the SHL delegates of all the PSA’s. Those issues who receive favorable passage will then be sent to the Kansas Legislature for their consideration during the 2023 Legislative Session. Some of these issues will be forwarded as actual bills, while the remainder will be in the form of resolutions.

These are the issues that will be presented to the full membership at this year’s Annual
Session: Support for Medicaid Expansion; Continued support for the KDOT Rural
Transportation program; Support for the Broadband Expansion as the law stipulates; Support
the expansion of Medicinal Cannabis; Support increase funding for the Senior Care Act; and
Support for the equalization of sales tax for the Area Agencies on Aging (AAA). For a brief overview of the aforementioned issues please visit the SHL website http://kansas-shl.org

The Silver Haired Legislators represent over 500,000 Kansas Seniors over the age of 60, most of whom vote in local, state and national elections. The SHL is just one of the ways their collective voice can be heard. There are other matters that the individual PSA can support local concerns with their perspective AAA.