House budget boosts aid by $10 million, not promised $73 million surge
TOPEKA — Rep. Steven Howe’s disappointment that state appropriations to school districts for special education hadn’t kept pace with legal thresholds for the past 14 years reflected a personal connection with students grappling with developmental, emotional, hearing or vision disabilities in the classroom.
“I want to represent students of my district and their families — students like Murray, who is confined to a wheelchair,” Howe said. “I think about people I know and people I’m neighbors with and people their kids go to school with my kids and the teachers that do come alongside them to support them.”
Howe, a Salina Republican, said it was frustrating lawmakers in the House voted to abandon a commitment made by the Kansas Legislature and Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly in 2024 to get behind an appropriation this year of $73 million for reimbursement of special education services delivered by school districts…