Maintenance money: Governor, lawmakers disagree on how much
Staff & Wire Reports
Thursday, April 19, 2007
TOPEKA — Gov. Kathleen Sebelius wants legislators to spend nearly $63 million as a first installment on long-needed repairs to state universities. Legislative budget chiefs say there will be additional money, but how much remains up in the air.
Emporia State University President Mike Lane said during a telephone interview this morning that he is encouraged that the governor and legislators are talking about adding to the deferred maintenance allocation. Lane was in Topeka to attend a meeting of the Kansas Board of Regents and spoke during a break from the meeting.
He said that the House of Representatives appropriations committee was discussing a figure different from the governor’s, and that he had heard the Senate also had taken the matter under consideration. Details, however, were not yet available.
“We certainly appreciate any effort to address the problem,” Lane said.
Lane hopes that legislators will look to the future, beyond the immediate stopgap measures.
“We are still looking for a long-term solution for a long-term problem,” he said.
Students at Fort Hays State University held a bake sale to draw attention to the need to finance maintenance at the state’s universities. Lane said they presented a $50 check this morning to the Regents.
“They only need to do $13 million more, and they’ve got this problem licked,” Lane said.
Under the governor’s proposal for additional funds, ESU would receive $3.6 million for improvements at William Allen White Library.
The deferred maintenance money was part of the governor’s request presented Tuesday for an additional $203 million in the upcoming budget year. The money would be added to the final budget bill lawmakers will consider when they return April 25 from their annual break.
Legislators already have sent the governor the $12.3 billion main budget to finance state government after July 1.
The governor’s request includes $47.7 million as a one-time appropriation to address the top priority needs on seven campuses, plus $15 million for unspecified maintenance projects.
“Earlier in this legislative session, I proposed a more comprehensive plan for dealing with university deferred maintenance. However, neither my plan, nor any other, has been enacted,” Sebelius said in her request to the House Appropriations and Senate Ways and Means committees.
Sebelius also asked for an additional $56.8 million for the current year, with most of that for growth in social service programs and to repay some Medicaid funds to the federal government.
The House panel began working on the budget bill Tuesday and the Senate committee will begin work Wednesday. The final version will be worked out by negotiators from the two chambers.
The governor and the Kansas Board of Regents have urged legislators to address the backlog of $663 million worth of projects.
Budget experts met this week to review state revenue and said that while the economy is in good shape, legislators don’t have large surpluses to take care of all funding requests, including state buildings, expanding social services or making huge tax cuts.
The question is what legislators eventually will do with the governor’s request for the campuses.
“I have no idea at this time how much of it will stay, but it probably will be in that ballpark,” said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Sharon Schwartz, R-Washington.
Schwartz said she wants legislators to have more oversight of how the money will be spent.
“There ought to be policies approved by the Legislature rather than a line item in the budget,” she said. “It’s a big enough issue that the full Legislature needs to weigh in on it.”
Senate Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dwayne Umbarger said deferred maintenance will be a serious contender, but just how much it will remain depends on what legislators decide.
“I’m fairly confident that we are going to designate significant resources to deal with deferred maintenance,” said Umbarger, R-Thayer. “It is always the process of prioritizing and seeing where the dollars are most needed.”
Umbarger said universities are the best judges of their most pressing needs.
“The institutions are more capable of prioritizing their list than we under the dome. I want to make sure we don’t replace their knowledge with our perceptions,” he said.
The issue of deferred maintenance at the various campuses has been a lingering one, with legislators doing little to make a significant dent in the backlog.
The last major legislative effort to deal with deferred maintenance was in 1996, when legislators authorized about $164 million in bonds to pay for repairs in a program dubbed “Crumbling Classrooms.”
Earlier this year, Sebelius outlined a plan for providing $575 million to universities over six years, but the idea was a nonstarter among most legislators.
Some legislators have suggested that universities tap private donors or increase tuition to help finance repairs.
situveux1 (anonymous) says...
WIBW reported today that the "Education" Governor requested $63M and the legislature requested $152M. Why would the Gazette leave the legislature's figure out? Could it be to make the Gov. look good? Selective reporting? The Gazette? Never.
April 19, 2007 at 10:57 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
glarson (anonymous) says...
Dear situveux1: The Gazette did not intentionally leave out the legislature's figure. In the interest of time, we opened the Associated Press story on deferred maintenance and called ESU President Michael Lane for comment.
The AP story that we used moved at 7 p.m. Wednesday and was the most up-to-date available to us on Thursday morning. The AP may not have had the Legislature's figures at that time. I have checked the original story to make sure we did not cut out the figure. We did not; it was not included.
Be assured that the issue of deferred maintenance at state universities, especially ESU, is one we will continue to follow.
Thank you your concern,
Gwendolynne Larson
Managing Editor
April 20, 2007 at 7:03 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
situveux1 (anonymous) says...
If you could clarify for me, which story are you referring to with "original story?" You said the figure was included, but I don't remember seeing another story published recently in the Gazette dealing with deferred maintenance. Does original story refer to an AP story?
Thanks
April 20, 2007 at 3:23 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Emporia_Proud (anonymous) says...
Yes, that is exactly what she says if you read the posting.
The beginning under the Title "Staff and Wire Reports"
They "opened the Associated Press Story"
"The AP story that we used moved at 7pm wed"
The "AP" may not of had the updated figures.
Is that clear enough for you. Duh!
April 20, 2007 at 3:54 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
situveux1 (anonymous) says...
No, actually, that isn't clear.
"The AP MAY NOT HAVE had the Legislature's figures"
"I have checked the ORIGINAL STORY to make sure we did not cut out the figure. We did not; it was included."
This can't refer to the AP story that moved on Wed night because she said the figure may not have been included, which means she doesn't know if it was or not.
Then she says the figure was included, but in the original story. However, in this story, it was cut, so which story does "original story" refer to?
To me, it seems to refer to an article they previously printed or a draft article, but it isn't clear from what she wrote.
The reason I ask is because if the figure was included in the draft of this article, then I stand by my criticism. They had plenty of room in the article to break down numbers of the governors proposal but claim to have cut the Legislature's numbers due to time and space constraints. That makes no sense and to me indicates they cut the figure for reasons other than in "the interest of time."
I'm sure many will disagree with me, but based on the article, the information I hope to be getting from the Gazette and the Gazette's past opinion page editorials on the Legislature, that will be my opinion.
If it was included in another article they printed previously that I never saw, then I am in the wrong.
Sorry asking for a clarification caused so much trouble for you, Emporia_Proud.
April 20, 2007 at 8:07 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
glarson (anonymous) says...
I'm sorry, situveux1, but you're reading over a key "not." Yes, "original story" refers to the AP story before we touched it. And what I said was this:
"I have checked the original story to make sure we did not cut out the figure. We did not; it was NOT included." (emphasis added).
What I mean is that the AP story did NOT include the Legislature's proposed figures. Therefore, The Gazette did NOT remove any information to slant the story for the governor.
Gwendolynne Larson
April 23, 2007 at 7:35 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Emporia_Proud (anonymous) says...
situveux1,
You just need to cool it. If you read what was written and understand the structure of the article you would see that there is no questions or no reason to clarify.
April 23, 2007 at 10:41 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
situveux1 (anonymous) says...
Thank you Gwen for you responses. You were very professional and that is appreciated.
The WIBW article was posted at 8:02pm on Wednesday night. The article says it came from AP wire reports and the article included the legislature's figure.
You say you took the figures used in your story from the AP story that moved on Wednesday night. Since the WIBW story appeared on Wednesday night and hasn't been updated since, I'm assuming they also took their information from the same article.
Obviously I don't have access to the original AP story because I'm not associated with the media, so all I know is that WIBW was able to find the figure and you were not. So I'm guessing they found it from a different source.
To me, it isn't rational that WIBW would go looking for information from a second source when they had the AP article.
I'm willing to accept your explanation as the truth, I just hope you can understand where I'm coming from and how this looks to me.
At any rate...I have read and reread your original response and without your second response, I would still come to the conclusion that at the end of that paragraph you were referring to your draft article and not the AP article. When you said the AP article may not have included the info, I took that to mean you didn't remember and did not check before posting. Obviously I misunderstood, so I really appreciate the follow-up.
Thanks
April 23, 2007 at 3:31 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )