Topeka ? Republican Gov. Sam Brownback’s administration delayed construction Wednesday of a new power plant for the Kansas Statehouse and four nearby government office buildings following bipartisan legislative criticism over the $20 million project’s financing.

Brownback’s office confirmed the delay after top GOP legislators said they’d been told the project was on hold temporarily. The Senate Ways and Means Committee also indefinitely postponed a confirmation hearing for interim Administration Secretary Sarah Shipman.

“A number of the legislators wanted to take another look at it, wanted some additional information. I said, ‘Sure,'” Brownback told reporters.

The Department of Administration wants to build the new power plant on the site of a parking lot north of the Capitol. It would replace a plant in a sixth building, the 1950s-era Docking State Office Building west of the Statehouse, which the department plans to demolish.

The agency is financing the project through a 15-year lease-purchase agreement with Bank of America, paying about 2.3 percent interest. The department would cover the $1.32 million in annual payments through the rent it charges to state agencies for their space.

Brownback suggested the delay in construction would last only “for a couple of days.”

“I don’t it to go on very long, so that there’s not costs associated with penalties for not getting it going in a timely fashion,” he said.

Legislators said they had expected to review the lease-purchase agreement before it was signed late last month. Senate President Susan Wagle, a Wichita Republican, said Wednesday that many legislators also have questions because the financing is unusual.

“There are unanswered questions about the use of taxpayer dollars in this situation, and the Legislature is committed to making certain there is transparency and accountability in this process,” House Speaker Ray Merrick, a Stilwell Republican, said in email statement.

The department had hoped to finish construction of the new power plant by the end of this year. Its officials contend keeping the Docking building open is not cost-effective because it needs between $75 million and $100 million worth of maintenance.

A few legislators have questioned that assessment. During an October meeting of a House-Senate committee that reviews construction projects, Republican Rep. Mark Hutton, of Wichita, suggested that the department reconsider its project.

A memo from the Legislature’s research staff last week said that at the same meeting, the chairman indicated to department officials that committee members “wanted to see the lease agreement prior to its finalization.”

Rep. Jerry Henry, of Atchinson, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, said Wednesday’s announcement of a delay in the projection suggests the department will “relook at the whole situation.”

Senate Ways and Means Committee Chairman Ty Masterson said Shipman’s confirmation hearing was delayed at the administration’s request. Shipman was the department’s top attorney and deputy secretary when Brownback appointed her secretary in July 2015. If she’s not confirmed, she’ll have to step down.

Hawley said there was a “miscommunication” about the timing of the committee’s confirmation hearing.

Masterson, an Andover Republican, said: “They didn’t want to get somebody caught in something unnecessarily.”