BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — The only real question about likely increases in tuition at Kentucky’s public universities and community colleges after the governor and legislature reduced higher education was: How much?

The answer came Tuesday from the Council on Postsecondary Education which set ceilings for the 2016-17 fiscal year for tuition and mandatory fees for in-state undergraduate students: between 5 and 5.9 percent.

The CPE set ceilings of 5 percent for the University of Kentucky and the University of Louisville, the states’s two research universities.

At the six comprehensive universities, sometimes called regional universities, the CPE approved a “common dollar increase” of $432 annually. The six are Eastern Kentucky University, Kentucky State University, Morehead State University, Murray State University, Northern Kentucky University and Western Kentucky University.

That amount would represent a 5.9 percent increase at Kentucky State.

The CPE approved a $9 per credit hour ceiling for the Kentucky Community and Technical College System at all its campuses.

“While it is always difficult to ask our students and families to pay more for college, these new ceiling attempt to balance our students’ ability to pay for college and the significant budget challenges facing our campuses,” said Dr. Bob King, CPE president.

The latest of those challenges is in the form of 4.5 percent cuts in funding for each of the next two years and a pending 2 percent cut for the remainder of the current fiscal year which ends June 30.

The 4.5 percent cuts were enacted in the new two-year state budget approved by the legislature and awaiting Gov. Matt Bevin’s decisions on line-item vetoes. He has until midnight on Wednesday, April 27 to make those.

The 2 percent cuts are the latest amount of cuts implemented by Bevin by executive order. Those cuts remain in limbo, however, because Democratic Attorney General Andy Beshear has challenged in Franklin Circuit Court Bevin’s constitutional authority to implement them in the absence of a revenue shortfall or legislative approval.

Bevin originally sought 9 percent cuts in the next two years and 4.5 percent cuts in the current year — cuts similar to those he sought in most other executive branch agencies and departments.

He wants to use the estimated savings of about $650 million to contribute to Kentucky’s poorly funded state pension systems.

The Democratic House opposed the cuts to higher education but it eventually agreed to a compromise with Bevin and the Republican Senate to 4.5 percent cuts in the next two years. That came after university presidents signed a letter agreeing to those.

The presidents also agreed to Bevin’s compromise offer of 2 percent cuts in the current year — contingent upon a court ruling Bevin can enact those on his own.

The CPE also announced after its meeting Tuesday a new policy on out-of-state or non-resident tuition and fees.

The new policy requires the universities to generate net tuition and fee revenue to equal or exceed 100 percent of the cost of instruction and services per student.

The amounts approved by the CPE Tuesday represent caps or maximum tuition fees. Each institution will submit actual tuition and fee proposals to the CPE at its June 3 meeting at Union College in Barbourville.

RONNIE ELLIS writes for CNHI News Service and is based in Frankfort. Reach him at rellis@cnhi.com. Follow CNHI News Service stories on Twitter at www.twitter.com/cnhifrankfort.