First-term Kansas Board of Regents member Alysia Johnston said questions recently raised about her alleged role in a financial crisis engulfing Fort Scott Community College are false and personally hurtful. 

Multiple Republican senators told State Affairs Johnston should be held accountable for the school having allegedly exceeded its legally published budget by roughly $700,000 in 2023, her final year as the school’s president. 

The college is still grappling with the financial fallout — implementing spending and hiring freezes while axing four sports programs and placing its first-year president on administrative leave. 

In an exclusive interview with State Affairs, Johnston said the school’s independent auditing firm was initially unaware Fort Scott had committed a statutory budget violation. 

“It was a violation of a statute that frankly nobody was aware of,” Johnston said, adding it primarily related to the school’s general fund ledger.

For consecutive fiscal years, the school erred by budgeting its “revenues or transfers-in as a negative expense, rather than showing it as revenue,” according to a representative from the school’s auditing firm — Chanute-based Jarred, Gilmore & Phillips, PA.

The $700,000 cost overrun surfaced after Heather Morgan, executive director of the Kansas Community College Association, found the school violated a penalty statute that was in place when Kansas community colleges were under the umbrella of the Kansas State Board of Education, and presented her findings to the Board of Regents. 

Morgan told State Affairs on Friday that she’s made it clear to Kansas Board of Regents Chair Jon Rolph and CEO and President Blake Flanders “that we’re not out to get Alysia.”

“The only thing I’ve said is that it was a statutory budget violation and have not talked about [Johnston] at all,” Morgan said. 

Morgan also confirmed she forwarded a memo to the governor’s office in the lead-up to Johnston’s January confirmation appointment, stating the school failed to make its November payroll — transpiring nearly six months after Johnston departed the school.

A 1965 law switched control of the state’s junior colleges, now community colleges, to the local level. The provision would assess the school a financial penalty in the same amount of its budget overage — which would deal a staggering financial blow to the small southeast Kansas college, which had a total budget of $17.3 million in FY 2023. 

Morgan also lobbied senators for a proviso that would have nullified the hefty financial penalty against the school, but it was ultimately rejected in late April by Senate President Ty Masterson. 

“This is about Fort Scott Community College,” Morgan said. “We’re trying to help the institution move forward.” 

Johnston strongly defended her time as Fort Scott’s president, saying the issue at hand is complex “with a lot of minutiae to it.”

“The [auditor] didn’t even find [the penalty provision],” Johnston said.

Audit revelations

The audit revealed financial missteps made late in Johnston’s tenure at Fort Scott. According to the report for fiscal year 2023, the college was “making financial decisions based on materially inaccurate information.” 

The audit revealed that reconciliations for asset and liability accounts “found transactions that were improperly classified and/or not recorded at all” — resulting in ledger adjustments after the fiscal year had concluded. 

“The College did not have adequate staff properly trained in the area of general ledger preparation, reconciliation, and review,” the audit report read. But Johnston said she was under the impression the school’s business office was actively trying to get its reconciliation issues on track. 

Republican senators called on her to either resign or recuse herself from an upcoming vote on the annual disbursement of funding to colleges statewide, as well as any board involvement related to the potential $700,000 penalty.

Johnston said such comments have been hurtful on a personal level, saying she was always conscious about her fiduciary responsibilities to the taxpayers of Bourbon County and Kansas. The allegation most distressing allegation, Johnston said, is that she misappropriated $700,000, calling it a “complete mischaracterization and out-and-out lie.” 

“My team and I are proud of what we were able to do at Fort Scott Community College,” she said. 

Johnston also told State Affairs that she is preparing a letter for senators who have questioned her role in Fort Scott’s financial crisis, as she seeks to clear her name. 

“I believe in owning my failures and mistakes, but this is not one of them,” she said.

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Matt Resnick is a statehouse reporter at State Affairs Pro Kansas/Hawver’s Capitol Report. Reach him at [email protected].

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