At the 'pinnacle'

Topekan Doug Mays has suffered some political disappointments, but in January he will ascend to the seat of speaker of the House

Doug Mays may aspire to higher office, but he says he has the political job that he always wanted -- speaker of the Kansas House of Representatives. "If I didn't do another thing again after being speaker of the House, I would be perfectly satisfied," Mays said. "To me, this is the pinnacle."

Mays, 52, lost his first bid for the Legislature in 1976. An advertising executive at KSNT-TV Channel 27, he ran against a Democratic incumbent.

"I was 25 years old and had lived in Topeka a grand total of three years. I didn't know the odds were stacked against me," he said. "I worked my heart out. I can't tell you how many thousands of doors I knocked on."

Mays was bitterly disappointed by the defeat, but he wasn't through with politics.

Two years later, Mays was the head of the Shawnee County Republican Party. In 1986, he volunteered to help get Mike Hayden elected governor.

Though Hayden was speaker of the House, he was considered a long shot to emerge from a crowded primary field with the GOP nomination. But with Mays' help, he won and went on to beat Lt. Gov. Tom Docking in the general election.

For his role in the campaign, Mays was appointed state securities commissioner. During the same period, he also served on the Topeka City Council.

In 1990, Mays was dealt another disappointment. Democrat Joan Finney defeated Hayden, forcing Mays out as securities commissioner several months before the end of his term as president of the North American Securities Administrators Association.

But, Mays said, if it hadn't happened he probably never would have run for the Legislature again.

Mays was elected to represent the 54th House District of south-central Topeka in 1992. He quickly allied himself with conservative Tim Shallenburger, who a few years later would become speaker of the House.

Shallenburger, who lost a bid for governor in November to Democrat Kathleen Sebelius, said Mays, while a conservative, is a practical politician who will compromise to make the process work. For a while, he said, that trait made some conservatives suspicious of Mays. But he said Mays earned their trust two years ago by agreeing to step up and challenge moderate Rep. Kent Glasscock, R-Manhattan, for speaker.

"I think that helped him a lot, because he got beat and then he was the martyr for a little while of the conservative cause," Shallenburger said.

Though Mays now has the trust of the conservatives, who command the biggest block of votes in the House, his willingness to compromise will be essential in the coming session if he is going to be successful in helping to craft a solution to the state's deepening budget problems.

"I think he is just exactly what they need over there right now," Shallenburger said.

Mays acknowledges that his pragmatism sometimes "frustrates some of my conservative friends."

But he said the severity of the state's budget problems demands a leader who knows how to negotiate and compromise with moderates and Democrats -- who are outnumbered by Republicans in the House 80-45.

Though Mays ruffled some feathers among moderate Republicans last week by replacing some key committee chairmen, newly elected Minority Leader Dennis McKinney, D-Greensburg, said he has forged a good working relationship with Mays since the two entered the Legislature together in 1992.

Sebelius, who served in the Legislature with Mays before being elected insurance commissioner and then governor, said she also believes she can work with him.

"We've known each other for years," she said. "He and I are committed to making this work with a coalition of legislators who can get some things done."

Since August, Gov. Bill Graves has been forced to order $167 million in budget cuts and other cost-saving measures to avert a projected $312.1 million deficit at the end of the fiscal year.

Sebelius is expected to propose more budget cuts in the 2004 budget that she submits to the Legislature in January.

Still, Mays cautions that people shouldn't view his willingness to compromise as an early indication that he is prepared to support another tax increase.

Mays said while he voted for a $252 million tax hike at the end of last session, he isn't willing to concede that another increase will be necessary to balance the 2004 budget.

"If you do that, you don't even try to cut the budget," he said, adding that all aspects of state government, including public education, should be cut back before a tax increase is considered.

Mays is a conservative, but like Shallenburger, he has a populist streak, in part because of his upbringing in the southeast corner of the state, a Democratic stronghold.

"I come from a family of farmers, miners and railroaders," the Pittsburg native said.

Mays' wife, Lena, said she met her husband while both were students at Pittsburg State University in the late 1960s. She remembers Doug as a gentleman, who was "real smart" but not very focused on school.

"Doug wasn't making good grades when I met him," she said. "He was just barely getting by."

But as the relationship grew more serious, so did Mays' attitude toward school. He was the first person in his extended family to graduate from college, earning a degree in fine arts. Lena, who now works for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas, graduated with a computer science degree.

After graduation in 1972, the two southeast Kansas natives -- Lena is from Girard -- moved to Topeka. They have been here ever since.

When Mays decided to run for the Legislature, his wife remembers "crying all day," because she knew that a career in politics would mean that he would spend less time at home. Twenty-six years later, tears well up in her eyes again as she describes how proud she is of her husband.

"I think it is Doug's calling," she said of politics and government. "It's a servant thing."

Sebelius is expected to propose more budget cuts in the 2004 budget

Although those budget cuts are going to hurt even more after she shovels a whole pot load of money to the teachers' union for a big, fat "thank you". What will be her next trick? Walking on water, maybe? fsf

Someone has suggested that the cuts Graves has made have been designed so that the only cuts Sebelius CAN make are only in education, thus boxing her into a corner and making her break her campaign promise not to cut education.

Hmmm...it's interesting to consider.

She's just going to raise our taxes to meet her spending desires. It just makes me SICK to think about it. My state taxes are already KILLING me.

Bill Bunten was elected to take Lynn Jenkins' seat in the Senate. I am very very very very very very VERY happy about that. He's got some great ideas about funding education that Tim Shallenburger at a rally said he wanted to use. I hope he's able to do some good stuff while he's in there. If his ideas are taken up, I think we can REDUCE taxes, not raise them. I'm a little concerned about what Kathleen will do though.

I wish you would have heard a presentation he gave back in June about education funding. It would be great to have him as governor, IMO.

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