BY: TIM CARPENTER
Kansas Reflector
Legislature is mulling proposal for $67 million in budget enhancements
TOPEKA — The Kansas Board of Regents is playing defense against cyberattacks on campuses, catch-up on employee salary increases and offense to secure a hike in need-based student aid.
This $67 million package of enhancements must run the gauntlet of the 2025 Legislature led by politicians interested in tightening screws on spending, including budgets for public higher education. To make the point clearly, the House Appropriations Committee asked how universities would respond if compelled to slash expenditures by 7.5%.
Blake Flanders, president and CEO of the state Board of Regents, said proposed investment in priorities of the six state universities included $10 million to upgrade information technology systems routinely targeted by extortionists. Another $10 million was requested for the state’s community colleges and technical colleges for the same purpose, he said.
The problem is more than hypothetical. Kansas State University confirmed a cyberattack in January 2024 that temporarily disrupted IT services.
“People are trying to hit your network,” Flanders said on the Kansas Reflector podcast. “Only one has to get through. So, the state rightfully has said we need to increase our level of cyber defense.”
Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly, in budget recommendations presented to the Legislature, would provide about half what the Board of Regents requested for IT security.
The Board of Regents also proposed appropriation of $27 million to increase salaries at University of Kansas, Kansas State University and the four other state universities by 5%. The governor recommended a 2.5% increase for all state employees.
Flanders said the Board of Regents’ proposal recognized lawmakers hadn’t appropriated enough from the state general fund in previous years so all campus employees were provided the standard raise. In other words, the process delivered enough for university employees to get a 2.5% raise when other state agencies were granted 5% increases for staff compensation.
“We’ve put that into our request, really, to keep our talent,” Flanders said. “Here’s what we know. We have researchers who are leaving the state, and when a researcher leaves the state they take their grant dollars with them. So, that’s an economic loss for our state and for the university.”
In addition, the Board of Regents sought to expand state funding for need-based student aid by $30 million annually. The objective would be to press ahead with a strategy to keep higher education affordable, fill workforce shortages and create economic prosperity.
The Legislature and governor over the past few years substantially increased that line item with a surge from about $25 million to $96 million.
“It’s been a tremendous increase, and it’s began to pay off. We have more first-generation students. Our student debt load is down,” Flanders said.
He said one consequence of budget tightening would likely be higher tuition rates. In the current academic year, tuition went up 2.8% at Kansas State and 6% at Fort Hays State University. Several universities ranged from 3.5% to 4%.
“We have really kept the cost of tuition increases lower than the rate of inflation. We want to try to continue to do that. That requires partnership, and it requires state investment and then it also requires us being as efficient as possible,” Flanders said.