TOPEKA—The Supreme Court today unanimously upheld the constitutionality of the newly consolidated city and county government in Wyandotte County.
The new government, called the Unified Government of Wyandotte County/Kansas City, Kansas, in today's ruling withstood challenges on 10 separate constitutional grounds. The court rejected all but two of the challenges and held that those two, although unconstitutional, could be severed from the rest of the enabling legislation and consolidation plan.
The enabling legislation and the plan for its implementation was challenged as violating various provisions of the state Constitution by Nick Tomasic, Wyandotte County District Attorney, who said he supports the new government but wanted to clear up concerns about its constitutionality.
Issues in the case, which was accepted as an original action filed directly in the Supreme Court, included challenges that it represented an unlawful delegation of power to an administrative agency, to a private entity and to voters in adopting it. Tomasic noted that the plan authorized the elimination of some public offices and conversion of others from elective to appointive positions, something the court said the legislature authorized by the enabling legislation.
The Unified Government became effective October 1, 1997, following the implementation of the Consolidation Act of 1996 and a local referendum adopting it that was conducted in April 1997. The referendum was placed on the ballot after a plan for the consolidation was adopted by a five-member Consolidation Study Commission that was established by the legislature. The plan took effect after neither house of the legislature objected.
Justice Bob Abbott, writing for a unanimous court, said the provision allowing the plan to take effect upon the voters' approval if the legislature did not object via a concurrent resolution violated the Constitution; however, that provision could be severed from the act. The court also ruled the issue concerning the legislature's reserved right to reject the plan is "irrelevant" because the legislature did not exercise it.
Justice Abbott said a second provision of the consolidation plan constituted an unlawful delegation of power to the judicial branch. That provision specifies that a newly created Ethics Commission within the Unified Government would be appointed by the Wyandotte County administrative judge with the consent of the other judges in the judicial district, a plan the Supreme Court found to be an unconstitutional delegation of power because it was accomplished through a city-county enactment. But the court ruled that provision also can be severed from the rest of the plan.
"Here, the appointment provision was not so important that the act, and the plan as part of it, would not have been passed by the legislature or approved by the voters, without it. The plan's provision, which required the court to delegate members to the Ethics Commission, was not an inducement for consolidation. Even without this provision, the act, with the plan, would have still operated to effectively carry out the intention of the legislature and the voters--that being consolidation of the local governments of Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas.
"Plus, the plan still would have provided for the Ethics Commission in the Unified Government; it simply would have provided a different method for appointment of the Ethics Commission members, Justice Abbott wrote.