Committee agrees to concur with amendments to Kansas Municipal Employee Whistleblower Act

The Committee on Local Government signaled agreement to concur with Senate amendments to House Bill 2,160, which would enact the Kansas Municipal Employee Whistleblower Act and establish protections and procedures for municipal employees who report unlawful or dangerous conduct.

Mr. Revisor, Revisor, summarized the Senate amendments: "the Senate amendments to the bill, first off, added a provision on page 2 that would allow disciplinary action if the employee has disclosed information due to a corrupt motive rather than a good faith concern for wrongful activity. The Senate also put in on page 3 a provision to allow for a municipal administrative process for handling complaints for violations of the act. And then finally, the Senate put in a provision regarding, liability of legislators who receive information that's been disclosed by an employee to limit the liability of those legislators, for any act or failure to act, when they receive that information." He later explained the committee revised the language to reference local governing bodies rather than legislators.

A committee member described the change as clarifying and said it could avoid burdening the courts: "I think this was a good move and it kind of clarifies things and and I think probably personally we although we didn't discuss the veil action or having that process veil I think if it's in place it's probably a good thing. There's no use bogging down the courts, at least from my standpoint." Committee members said the provisions reflected testimony received in committee and that the Senate committee had reported the measure unanimously.

Committee members then agreed to bring the bill forward to concur with the amendments "as amended"; committee leadership recorded no dissension and closed the conference committee.