University cuts proposed as legislators look to close budget gap - University of Kansas

The luck of the Irish took a detour around the Kansas Statehouse this week, with lawmakers scrambling to find "creative" ways to build the state's budget. Using blunt objects in many instances, the House and Senate budget-writing committees molded the State General Fund budget to fit a drastically reduced resource scenario. This was especially true in the House Appropriations Committee where the budget package crafted there made the most severe cuts to higher education in modern times. Not only did the House package take $29 million from the state's colleges and universities for next year's operations, it also "swept" funds in our budgets and imposed a "cap" on overall salaries and wages. The most counter-productive part of that is the cap would apply regardless of funding source! House authors of this proposal are now (fortunately) working to re-write it and we are encouraged by that news. http://publicaffairs.ku.edu/govrelations/state/updates/2013/mar15