As the 2025 legislative session wraps up, University of Minnesota officials are expecting less state funding, which could lead to education cuts or tuition increases.
The University expects to receive about $10 million less in overall funding compared to the last session. Without additional funding, the University expects to reduce spending in areas like research or increase tuition, University spokesperson Amy Tolson said in a statement.
The expected funding for the University falls well below the around $200 million increase in funding that University officials had asked for before the session began. Combined with the decrease in federal funding and inflation, the University’s finances will be taking a hit.
“We understand the state of Minnesota is facing difficult budget circumstances, and we are grateful to legislators for their work to minimize cuts to the University,” Tolson said in a statement. “Maintaining our operations and maintenance funding will benefit the University community as a whole, across all five campuses, and the entire state. However, with inflation, this would still amount to a 3% reduction.”
Most of the decrease in state funding comes down to the Legislature approving less one-time funding as state lawmakers hope to get ahead of an expected $6 billion deficit for the 2028-29 budget cycle.
Earlier this week, the Minnesota House passed its around $4 billion higher education budget, which includes increasing the University’s operations and maintenance funding by about $26 million. The Senate passed its version Thursday. There will be a conference committee to hammer out the differences between the two versions before the governor can sign it.
The University also asked for around $200 million in their Higher Education Asset Preservation and Replacement at the start of the session to fund infrastructure repairs.
“If a bonding bill were to pass this session, we would be grateful for any HEAPR funding we may receive. However, $200 million is the minimum amount required to keep our $6 billion backlog in needed repairs from growing,” University Vice President Alice Roberts-Davis said in a statement. “With reduced funding, we will be unable to address the more than 100 projects we had identified as priorities in this year’s legislative request.”
The University’s funding woes with the Legislature are not new. The University asked for about $500 million for HEAPR as part of a bill that ultimately did not pass. They also asked for about $90 million more in funding but got about half that.
University research at stake
The University’s Cannabis Research Center could be another victim of less higher education funding this session.
Traci Toomey, director of the Cannabis Research Center, said the research center researches and collects data about cannabis use and its effects to help inform state agencies and lawmakers. The center was created in October 2023 after cannabis was legalized that summer.
“What are local public health agencies being asked to do around cannabis legalization? What are the issues that they’re running into? So that the state also knows how to prioritize how to help local public health,” Toomey said. “We’re doing work like that.”
Toomey said the center faces a challenge trying to gain state funding because, although the center provides data and research to the entire state, it receives money through the Legislature’s Higher Education Committee because it is housed at the University of Minnesota. Without the funding, the center would have to narrow the widespread research it currently conducts.
As a professor, Toomey said she hopes funding for higher education can be supported as much as possible, but as the Cannabis Center director, she is worried about its future. Since the cannabis center is not covered by the University’s guaranteed core operations and maintenance funding, it will likely lose funding in the end.
“I hope the state figures out how to fund the Cannabis Research Center because we’re providing a critical service to the state,” Toomey said.
The funding the Bell Museum receives directly from the Legislature may also get cut if the bill passes this session, said Holly Menninger, Bell Museum executive director.
“I’ve been to the Capitol several times this week and several times last week, just to make sure that we’re helping legislators understand what, in our case, a pretty modest investment by the state, what that means and what that return on investment looks like,” Menninger said.
In a letter to Sen. John Marty (DFL-Roseville), Menninger asked lawmakers to reconsider eliminating all funding to the Bell Museum. Without the funding, they expect reduced staffing, delays in information to state agencies and decreased public access to their research, Henninger said in the letter.
“Continued state support for the Bell’s collections is even more important now given massive cuts at the federal level targeting museums and collections,” Henninger said in the letter.
The Bell Museum has received annual funding from the Legislature since the 1970s, Menninger said. This funding helps the museum continue to research and create collections to educate state agencies, like the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, and the public to better understand the state’s biodiversity.
“The takeaway here is that we put our collections to work for the benefit of the state, not just those state agencies, but for students, other researchers, and universities,” Menninger said. “That investment is really important to us.”