BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana’s top higher education board is asking for a nearly $220 million state budget increase next year, saying the money would aid its work to boost the number of people obtaining degrees and professional certifications beyond high school.
The Board of Regents unanimously agreed to the 2022-23 budget request Wednesday, sending it to Gov. John Bel Edwards and state lawmakers for review as they craft state spending plans for the financial year that starts in July 2022. That budget will be decided in the next regular legislative session that starts in March.
The hefty ask — which would increase the more than $1.17 billion higher education budget by nearly 20% — comes after public college programs received a $97 million spending increase this budget year. Campuses also have received hundreds of millions of dollars in federal pandemic aid outside of the state budget process.
“We are eager to maintain the momentum this investment has ignited as we work to accelerate talent development,” Commissioner of Higher Education Kim Hunter Reed said in a statement.
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