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Since our last state legislative update in May, quite a bit has happened in both Missouri and Kansas. In addition to interim committees and legislative planning, Missouri held a special session in September focusing on redistricting and reforming the citizen-led ballot initiative. Meanwhile, Kansas began efforts toward a redistricting process of its own. There are numerous state legislative and policy developments. Let’s review the details.
First, a note on both states regarding recent federal policy changes, namely HR1 or the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill Act’. Kansas and Missouri are currently convening health care and policy experts to submit a joint application for the Rural Health Transformation Fund (RHTF). With Medicaid funding cuts set to begin next year, these dollars are crucial for supporting struggling rural hospitals. While the RHTF offers a pool of $50 billion for states to support rural health care, the available funds are insufficient to offset the estimated $140 billion that rural communities stand to lose in health care funding over the next decade due to HR1’s Medicaid reductions.
In early September, an extraordinary session was called by Governor Kehoe to focus on two subjects: redrawing the boundaries of two of the state’s congressional districts, including Kansas City’s Fifth Congressional District and changing the thresholds to pass ballot initiatives.
On redistricting, the General Assembly passed HB1, splitting Kansas City into three Congressional districts.The resulting districts split primarily urban Kansas City into three segments with boundaries that span further into rural parts of the state. This process — gerrymandering — will dilute rural and urban interests in these three districts and lead to representation of these communities by elected officials who do not share their challenges or personal experiences. We opposed this legislation during the special session and continue to oppose gerrymandering in Missouri.
Prior to gathering signatures, opponents of the Legislature’s redistricting filed multiple lawsuits challenging various aspects of the special session process including redrawing maps outside of the census process, and errors in how boundary lines were drawn. These lawsuits remain ongoing and, if successful, will nullify the new maps. More recently, the government filed its own lawsuit against the campaign, disputing the legality of the signature-gathering effort. Despite this, signature collection continues at full speed with 150,000 signatures gathered to date and more than a month remaining to secure the required valid signatures.
The new map — which divides Kansas City along the historic racial dividing line of Troost Avenue — is being met with challenges as local groups and advocates are gathering signatures to send the provision to a statewide vote. If enough valid signatures — around 112,000 — are gathered by mid-December, the maps will go on the ballot in 2026 for Missouri voters to weigh in on.
The other big issue coming out of the extraordinary session is about the citizen-led initiative petition process. House Joint Resolution 3 (HJR 3) was passed by both chambers and would change the threshold to adopt a ballot initiative from a simple majority statewide to a majority of voters in all eight congressional districts — giving just one district veto power over voters across the state. Medicaid expansion and access to reproductive freedom in Missouri would not have passed were this threshold in place. This measure will go to Missourians sometime in 2026 and only requires a simple majority to pass. We also opposed this legislation during the session.
Last, but certainly not least, one of the most active special interim committees in Missouri has been on property taxes. There have been more than half a dozen meetings across the state gathering information on how property values are assessed and what property taxes support. If you’d like to dive into this topic a bit deeper, please check out our policy issue brief on property tax assessment.
Interim committees are incredibly important to keep track of. Not only do they help provide lawmakers and advocates with a key opportunity to have a substantive and information-rich discussion, but these committees also preview what may end up being key pieces of legislation considered in 2026.
While Missouri’s special session has concluded, an effort is underway in Kansas toward their own redistricting process. Lawmakers are targeting a Nov. 7 date, pending enough signatures from legislators to initiate a special session.
The redistricting effort in Kansas aims to gerrymander Johnson County into more rural districts. Currently, not enough members of the Kansas House have signed on to the special session petition, which needs to be two thirds of each chamber to call the special session. Advocates are currently educating legislators on the harms of redrawing district lines outside of the usual census informed process in hopes that this threshold is not met.
The Kansas legislature made significant shifts last year, both to the pace of the session and on the budget process. Historically, governors have rolled out their budget at the beginning of the session. However, due to a change made by the Legislature last year, the budget process is now initiated by the Legislature. State departments now submit requests in September to the Legislature for the following budget year, with the Legislature moving ahead with the process before Gov. Kelly makes her recommendations in early 2026.
Gov. Kelly has taken to the road heading to eight different Kansas communities to seek their input on budget priorities in advance of the 2026 session. At the first event in Salina, much was discussed about the current state of the budget and what may be on the horizon, especially considering impacts from federal budget bill and some significant tax changes made last year that will exhaust the state’s current $3 billion surplus in just three years.
Kansas’ interim committees this year have been robust as well, with the Bob Bethell Joint Committee on KanCare Oversight facing a lot of issues, including the impacts of HR1, the health care workforce shortage in Kansas, and barriers to health access overall in the state. Another Special Committee on Taxation focused on other policies considered last session, including the sunset of the affordable housing tax credit. Some recent reports from the Kansas Legislative Division of Post-Audit showed data on the cost of the tax credits over time, which gives advocates a chance to reconsider what a revised affordable housing tax credit may look like.
