State Reps. Kevin Yoder, R-Overland Park, left, and Bill Feuerborn, D-Garnett, debate a budget bill Wednesday in the Kansas House of Representatives.

Topeka ? House Republicans on Wednesday pushed through budget cuts that they described as tough but fair, but Democrats called the reductions too drastic, especially to public schools.

“We’re taking a step backwards,” said House Democratic Leader Paul Davis of Lawrence.

Court-ordered school finance increases were producing improved student test scores, and now the Legislature was reneging on those funds, Democrats said.

But state Rep. Kevin Yoder, R-Overland Park, and chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said the proposed reductions in the current fiscal year were necessary to bridge the state’s growing budget gap, now approaching $200 million.

“We are spending more money than we are bringing in. This cannot be sustained,” Yoder said. His bill would reduce spending by $305 million.

The measure was given tentative approval 72-46 on a non-record vote. Final House action will come today, and then budget negotiators will meet with state senators who have passed their own version.

The main dispute in the House was over education funding.

Yoder’s original bill would have cut schools by $66.6 million — a 1.5 percent across the board cut. But he immediately pushed for an amendment to reduce that to a 1 percent cut.

That amendment passed 75-47 on an almost straight party-line vote. Most Democrats voted against the amendment because they said they wanted to make the school cuts smaller.

That set the tone for the debate as Republicans defeated amendments by Democrats to reduce the school cut further.

“The only thing in our budget that is constitutionally-mandated is schools,” said state Rep. Jim Ward, D-Wichita. “We say we have to protect schools first.”

The House plan would result in a $1,167,124 cut to the Lawrence school district in the current school year. The Senate has produced a bipartisan plan that would cut schools by about one-half of the House plan, resulting in a $556,061 cut to Lawrence schools.

Davis and other Democrats argued that the House GOP reductions with only half of the budget year left were too hard for schools to absorb. He said numerous districts will have to use all their emergency funds to cover the shortfall, including Baldwin City and Tonganoxie.

“These are districts that are going to have to make serious, serious cuts,” he said.

But Republicans argued the more that could be cut in the current fiscal year, the less will have to be cut in the next fiscal year, which starts July 1.

They also said revenues had dropped too much to spare schools, which makes up about one half of state funding. “There is no money tree at the end of the rainbow,” Yoder said.