Kansas University Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little answers questions and provides an update about KU’s accomplishments and opportunities over the past year during an informal forum Tuesday, Feb. 9, 2016, at The Commons in Spooner Hall.

Construction projects and concerns about future state funding made up a large portion of matters discussed by Kansas University Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little during a campus update session Tuesday.

About 35 KU community members, nearly all faculty and administrators, attended the informal update and question-and-answer session with the chancellor in Spooner Hall.

Gray-Little said a look around the campus reveals a lot of significant construction projects.

Kansas University Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little answers questions and provides an update about KU’s accomplishments and opportunities over the past year during an informal forum Tuesday, Feb. 9, 2016, at The Commons in Spooner Hall.

The planned $350 million Central District redevelopment — in the area west of Naismith Drive — will include a new integrated science building, a new residence hall, a new apartment building slated in part for athletes, a new student union to replace the Burge, a power plant and a parking garage.

“It’s a very large project, and we’ve tried for years to get at least the science building done,” Gray-Little said.

Elsewhere on campus, the new engineering building has recently opened; construction of the new business building, Capitol Federal Hall, is nearly complete; and construction on the Earth, Energy and Environment Center is underway — to name a few projects.

Looking ahead, Gray-Little said, KU will be closely watching the Kansas Legislature because the university depends on the state for important financial support.

“They have a very challenging task in front of them this year,” she said.

She said more will be known when the Legislature wraps up its session in late spring but that there’s always the possibility for budget cuts later in the year, should state revenues not meet projections — such uncertainty making it difficult for KU to fashion a budget.

School of Education Dean Rick Ginsberg said he was concerned about stagnant faculty salaries and asked for the chancellor’s thoughts on how to inform legislators that KU competes nationally to recruit professors.

Given the state’s budget shortfall, Gray-Little said she doesn’t expect additional state dollars for faculty and staff salaries this year, even though some legislators have seemed receptive in theory.

“I’ve had that conversation with some legislators, and they understand and respect and are concerned about this,” she said. “I would say there are some that don’t show in any way they are interested in our competitiveness, so it’s a hard conversation to have.”

She said KU Endowment’s ongoing Far Above fundraising campaign is scheduled to wrap up this summer and that, when the next campaign is launched, she hopes it will include a focus on faculty support.

In other updates, the chancellor said:

• The provost search committee has identified and is beginning to review candidates to replace Jeff Vitter, who left KU at the end of 2015 to become chancellor of the University of Mississippi.

“This is a national search,” she said, “meaning we expect to have candidates from around the country as well as internal.”

• The Far Above campaign had raised $1.5 billion as of December, exceeding its initial $1.2 billion goal.

• At the end of January KU shared online its official Diversity Action Plan, in response to campus discussions on diversity and inclusion. A previously planned general climate survey will be coming this fall.

• KU is launching a new branding campaign this semester, led by director of marketing communications Gerald Holland. The Jayhawk, the logo and the font will not change, she said. But the campaign will look for “new and consistent ways to help KU tell a story.”