Kansas looks to tech to modernize agency rulemaking
Jordan McAlister via Getty Images
By
Chris Teale
The state will use a cloud-based platform to draft, publish and take comments on regulations, having relied on paper since 1965.
Another state is turning to technology to make its regulatory process more streamlined, as Kansas announced early this month it would modernize its rulemaking.
The state partnered with regulatory and policy management platform Esper, which means its agencies will be able to draft regulations in real time and involve multiple stakeholders, then move it through the approvals process through the platform. Proposed regulations then would be submitted and published for public review, with comments from the public then tracked and collated.
It represents a major modernization of the state’s regulatory process, which had been paper-based since 1965 and required agencies to review documents manually and then store them in physical filing cabinets. Kansas expects to transition onto Esper’s cloud-based platform early next year, having been in discussions with the company for the last two years, including the procurement process.
"Kansas is committed to leading the way in building a more efficient and accessible regulatory system,” Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab said in a statement released by Esper. “Our partnership with Esper equips state agencies with modern capabilities to work more efficiently, operate with greater transparency, and deliver lasting impact for Kansans."
The partnership is part of a broader effort Schwab is spearheading to modernize the state’s regulatory process, which he said is burdensome for state agencies, has high storage and paper costs and lacks transparency for the public. And he said the modernization is “long overdue,” noting that the state has records as far back as 2003 “where state employees called attention to the inefficiencies of the current process and pleaded for reform.”
That effort will be bolstered by Esper, an eight-year-old company that already works with state agencies across the country and has existing statewide contracts with Iowa, Tennessee and Montana. Company CEO Maleka Momand said in a recent interview their work is important, as many agencies are “facing bottlenecks and a ton of inefficiencies internally, with their more manual-based ways of doing things, and are looking to upgrade to more automated processes.”
“They knew that their policy management process was sort of broken,” Momand added.
In Kansas, the process to get a new regulation approved is especially convoluted, and has roles for the agency drafting the regulation, the state’s Department of Administration, the Attorney General’s Office, the Division of the Budget and the Secretary of State. All have multiple steps to complete, with the paper-based regulation needing to be hand-stamped and physically moved around between agencies and sometimes legislators before it can be approved. It's a similar story in most states, and has led to frustration about how long it takes to get a regulation finalized.
“It's not super user friendly from a citizen or business owner perspective, to navigate the regulation process,” Momand said.
Instead, the Esper platform will unify every stage of the rulemaking process and enable each of the relevant parties to move it forward without having to shuffle paper around government offices. State officials said the change will ensure “that all stakeholders from agency staff to Kansas residents are better informed and better served.”
And Esper has the capability to compare proposed regulations against existing state and federal law. That makes the compliance process easier, and Momand said it will enable Kansas officials to compare their regulations with neighboring states.
Others have already done similar work in using technology to compare themselves with their peers. Virginia, for example, has turned to artificial intelligence in a bid to “supercharge” its regulatory streamlining efforts and examine how they compare to neighboring states, turning to agentic AI for help. The effort also makes life easier for state employees, who can focus less on moving paper around and instead on other things.
“We're getting people out of paperwork and helping them focus on actual substantive policy, with less administrative overhead, less inefficiencies, time saving, cost savings,” Momand said. “This should result in an easier to search, easier to navigate, regulatory code in Kansas that's more accessible, transparent and visible to everyone.”