Lawmakers last year not only rejected the Board of Regents’ request they restore the collective $8 million slashed from the universities midyear, in response to the pandemic, but they denied any increase at all for the regent universities — which had requested a combined $18 million bump in higher ed-specific funds. The Iowa Legislature the year before granted the board a higher education increase of $12 million, which was below the regents’ $18 million ask. But that came only after big cuts for the 2018 budget year, when appropriations were reduced more than $30 million below fiscal 2017 levels.
