Topeka ? Kansas University officials on Thursday praised a Senate committee recommendation that essentially restored funding from earlier proposed cuts to higher education.

University officials said the action by the Senate Ways and Means panel was an important development in funding public colleges and universities as lawmakers grapple with a record $700 million state budget shortfall.

“This was a significant, positive step in the right direction,” said Janet Murguia, KU’s executive vice chancellor of university relations.

Higher education officials otherwise haven’t had much to cheer about this legislative session.

Proposals from Gov. Bill Graves and earlier spending plans would have cut higher education budgets from about 6 percent to nearly 13 percent. And state leaders, because of budget problems, quickly dashed hopes of providing a promised increase for faculty salaries and community college property tax relief.

Ways and Means Committee member Sen. Christine Downey, D-Inman, however, said the proposed budget cuts were shortsighted and urged the panel to at least bring higher education spending for the next fiscal year up close to the current level.

She said she feared that if the higher education budgets were cut, then schools would simply increase tuition to make up the difference.

“That goes to accessibility to college, and that concerns me,” Downey said.

The committee completed its plan Wednesday night. But legislative staff still were reviewing the committee’s work Thursday, and the panel’s members didn’t know exactly how big a tax increase their plan would require. Researchers said it was likely to be at least $200 million.

In all, an estimated $700 million separates the state’s spending requirements from its expected revenues over the next 15 months. The proposals before the Taxation Committee would raise taxes on sales, tobacco and estates by various months.

Committee chairman Steve Morris, a Hugoton Republican, said the committee’s level of funding was probably the best that higher education was going to get this year.

Under the committee plan, higher education would receive roughly the same amount for the year starting July 1 as it did for the previous 12 months.

Officials with KU and other schools maintain they are still getting shorted about 3 percent because the proposed appropriation doesn’t include funds to cover the costs of salary and health insurance increases that were instituted during the current fiscal year.