Topeka ? The head of a state economic development agency received a $60,000 bonus, enough to add 40 percent to his $150,000 annual salary.

Tracy Taylor, president and chief executive officer of KTEC, also received an-other $52,000 for his work on bioscience efforts for the state, for a total salary of $262,000.

The KTEC bonuses and supplemental salary payments were released Tuesday in a legislative audit.

From 2004 through the current year, KTEC will have paid more than $550,000 in additional compensation to 21 employees – $330,000 in bonuses and $224,000 in supplemental pay for work done on behalf of the Kansas Bioscience Authority.

In addition, the Mid-America Technology Center, a wholly owned subsidiary of KTEC, paid $437,000 in bonuses to 44 workers during the past three years.

Facing a full agenda of reports, members of the Legislative Post Audit Committee reviewed the audit quickly during a meeting Tuesday, but several members expressed concern about the size of the bonuses.

“We have a responsibility to make sure that public funds are handled the way we intend them to be,” said state Rep. Peggy Mast, R-Emporia.

State Rep. Tom Sawyer, D-Wichita, said the bonuses were too high.

“There needs to be better accountability,” Sawyer said. “They hand out these bonuses a little too freely.”

But Taylor and Douglas Brush of Downs, who is chairman of the KTEC board, defended the bonuses as necessary to keep high-quality employees.

“We are proud of the accomplishments of KTEC,” Brush said, mentioning KTEC’s help in luring companies to Kansas, leading legislative efforts on economic development, and reducing its staff size.

KTEC stands for the Kansas Technology Enterprise Corp., which was established by the Legislature as a public corporation to promote high-tech development in Kansas.

In general, KTEC was able to avoid restrictions on state employee bonuses because the payments were made through investment earnings on KTEC holdings, not from state funds, according to the audit.

And KTEC received supplemental payments of $448,333 from the Kansas Bioscience Authority for operations and management services. The audit said the contract between the authority and KTEC was “very vague.”

KTEC officials said the salaries of top KTEC officials were justified and should be compared with the salaries of top university officials.

The audit showed university salaries ranging from $179,000 for the vice president of institutional advancement at Kansas State University to $480,000 for the executive vice chancellor at the Kansas University Medical Center.

Sawyer, the Wichita legislator, said that peer comparison was “kind of ridiculous.”

The higher education officials administer much larger budgets and staffs than KTEC, he said.

Sawyer said he was certain the bonuses would be scrutinized further when KTEC went through its budget process during the legislation session, which starts in January.