Stop me if you’ve heard this before…
Allen County Community College trustees heard a familiar refrain regarding the state budget at their regular monthly meeting Thursday, and it’s the same sour tune.
Steve Troxel, vice president for finance and operations, told trustees that the state’s budget picture continues to grow more dismal, which makes more cuts in education funding increasingly possible.
Troxel spoke about recent conversations with a state budget official, “and I don’t think I’ve ever heard him as discouraged as he is now.”
Even after cuts the past two years, state revenues still are falling short of anticipated expenses, Troxel said, to the tune of $40 million alone since November.
Kansas is anticipating a $400 million shortfall this year, Troxel noted, with legislators giving mixed signals on how that shortfall will be made up.
Gov. Mark Parkinson’s proposal to increase the state’s sales tax rate was quickly rejected, although a similar proposal may be coming soon, Troxel said.
And meanwhile, legislators have tossed around the idea of eliminating certain tax breaks, “but those aren’t enough to make a real difference,” Troxel said.
And there’s another reason to mope. Federal stimulus funds, which saved the state from making even deeper cuts in 2009, will be spent by 2012, with the state’s economic forecast still not expected to improve by then, Troxel said.
State lawmakers likely will need to pursue a federal waiver in order to cut education funding again, Troxel said, because so much has been pared in the past two years. Two states already have received such a waiver.
To illustrate the financial straits, Troxel noted that the state is spending $1 billion less on its budget than it did just two years ago. And, the state was forced to borrow federal monies to pay for its February unemployment benefits.
“It’s just not a pleasant picture,” Troxel said.
AS EXPECTED, a mediation process to settle the college’s dispute with Custom Energy went nowhere, trustees were told.
College President John Masterson and Troxel sat in on the mediation session spearheaded by the Kansas Corporation Commission Jan. 20 regarding Custom Energy’s installation in 2006 of $2 million worth of purportedly more efficient climate control systems .
But those systems have yet to bring about promised energy savings, to the tune of about $80,000 annually.
The college contended that the agreement stipulated that if the savings weren’t realized, that Custom Energy would pay for the added energy costs.
