One lawmaking body in the Kansas Legislature won�t have a single licensed lawyer in the 2017 session.



That is so rare that state statutes on the books for decades and presuming the 40-member Senate would have a licensed attorney in the ranks will have to be modified.



�This is a new low-water mark for the Senate,� said Sen. David Haley, D-Kansas City.



Haley is a longtime state legislator and a lawyer. However, his license has not been current for years.



The statute spelling out membership on the Joint Committee on Special Claims against the State specifies that at least one senator shall be on the committee who is an attorney �licensed to practice law in the state of Kansas.� Another statute, dealing with uniform state law commission, also will need to be modified to fit the reality of the makeup of the 2017 Senate, said outgoing Senate Vice President Jeff King, a lawyer.



�Valuable insight�



�I think the Legislature is always at its best when we have a cross-section of the population, when we have people from a variety of different professions, different backgrounds, different ages, different life experiences,� said King, R-Independence.



�Whenever you have a legislative body whose job is to write laws without any lawyer whatsoever, that�s some valuable insight you�re going to lose,� King said.



The House of Representatives has 125 members and does not face the same quandary.



Lawyers have not dominated the Senate. A check of legislative directories revealed that in 1998, there were a couple; in 2005, six licensed attorneys; and in 2009, five licensed attorneys.



For the last four years, the Senate has had two licensed attorneys: King and Majority Leader Terry Bruce, R-Nickerson. King did not run for re-election, and Bruce was defeated in the August primary election.



Attorney Bill Hutton challenged Sen. Steve Fitzgerald, R-Leavenworth, in November, but narrowly lost.



Staff



Haley spoke admiringly of the attorneys he has served with in the House and Senate. �I think we�ve sharpened each other,� he said.



�I�ve had the privilege of honing and being honed by many different legal philosophies,� he said.



He said former House Speaker Mike O�Neal, elected from Reno County, has �a brilliant legal mind,� and outgoing Rep. Jan Pauls, Hutchinson, is an �excellent jurist.� Haley called Bruce �a walking statute book� and better than Google.



Kansas Attorney Gen. Derek Schmidt previously served in the Senate, and Jay Scott Emler, an attorney appointed to the Kansas Corporation Commission, also once served in the Senate.



On the Senate Judiciary Committee, King has been chairman and Haley is the ranking minority member. Bruce also is on Judiciary. In 2017, that committee with no licensed attorneys or former law enforcement officers will be considering legislation dealing with criminal justice and courts. From King�s perspective, that�s a problem.



Will that increase the power of legislative staff or non-elected people?



Haley does not think the situation will be that much different than what happens on other committees, where citizen legislators have to learn about various topics.



�Very few of us, myself included, are well-versed in multiple topics,� Haley said.



Pay problem?



Kansas does not appear to have a shortage of attorneys. Kansas has about 11,000 attorneys with active licenses � about 8,000 live in Kansas and about 3,000 live outside the state, said Lisa Taylor, public information director for the Office of Judicial Administration.



�I think this is representative of the changing composition of the people running for the Legislature,� King said of the dearth of attorneys in the Senate.



Both Haley and King said the Kansas Legislature ranks in the high 40s on the comparative list of state legislative compensation. The base per diem for a Kansas legislator is $88.66, with $142 a day for subsistence.



�We should pay legislators more,� Haley said.



The amount of time required to be a good legislator is a �substantial commitment� beyond the 90-day session, King said. Some sessions run longer than 90 days and some legislators are on committees that meet outside the session.



King did not consider it very likely a pay hike would pass, so he introduced legislation to keep the odd-numbered years to 100-day sessions � when the budget is written � and to limit even-numbered-year sessions to 60 days. The bill passed only one chamber, the Senate.