Senate Appropriations Committee advances higher education budget with targeted increases, study of formula

Senate Bill 2003, the higher education budget, advanced out of the Senate Appropriations Committee after committee members adopted an amendment and defeated a separate proposal to expand challenge-grant eligibility to two private colleges.

Senator Sorbach, a member of the Appropriations Committee who led the bill presentation, said the package combines formula funding changes, one-time project funding and targeted operating increases. "We put the 910,000 in there," he said referring to child-care assistance added in the bill. The committee voted to amend the bill and later gave the amended bill a unanimous-or-majority committee recommendation to pass to the floor (committee vote: 15–1).

The bill makes a number of specific funding moves. Among the items described in committee testimony and bill language: a $910,000 appropriation for child-care assistance; an increase of $2,000,000 for the state scholarship fund (from $29 million to $31 million); a $200,000 increase in tribal-college scholarships for non‑enrolled members to $1,600,000; an allocation for dual-credit tuition scholarships drawn from Bank of North Dakota profits (one-time funding in the bill); $950,000 for Emerald Ash Borer mitigation grants administered by the North Dakota Forest Service; $12,000,000 for UND’s National Security Crossroads program; $12,000,000 for NDSU’s New Horizons…