r/kansas • u/Revenge_of_Larry • 5h ago
News Fourteen emails in 4 months: Records show Masterson’s work at alleged ‘no-show job’
Newly released records give evidence of at least some of the work Kansas Senate President Ty Masterson has done as GoCreate director at Wichita State University — a role that has emerged as a political liability during his campaign for governor.
Masterson has emphatically denied accusations that it’s a “no-show job” he uses to enrich himself beyond his compensation as a top Republican lawmaker in Topeka.
The Star requested copies of every email Masterson sent from his university email address between April 11, the day the Legislature’s session ended, and Aug. 10, shortly before he announced he would go on unpaid leave from the Koch family-funded community workshop for the remainder of the campaign.
Masterson sent 14 emails over four months, according to the WSU general counsel’s office.
During the same time period, Assistant Director Kimberly McCollum, whose LinkedIn page lists her as director of GoCreate, sent 532 emails, the office said. The digital records of Masterson’s emails that WSU turned over were heavily redacted.
More than 17 of the 26 pages provided were either blank or completely redacted, with large black boxes covering entire messages rather than specific pieces of sensitive information. Only four of Masterson’s emails were readable.
They demonstrated scant evidence of major work-related initiatives the director was applying himself to at the time.
Masterson has spoken openly in the past about struggling with dyslexia. As leader of the Senate Republican caucus, his leadership style is one that prioritizes face-to-face conversations.
Digital footprint
An administrative assistant at GoCreate emailed her boss on May 5 to tell him she had “just received a call from someone asking to speak with Ty Masterson.”
“I didn’t confirm or deny whether you were affiliated with GoCreate, and based on how I responded, he assumed he may have reached the wrong number,” Breanna Martin wrote Masterson, adding that staff members were “tracking which sites may have GoCreate listed as a political contact for you.”
WSU redacted Masterson’s reply. On May 28, Masterson sent McCollum, his assistant director, a link to a Reedy Branch Equipment webpage listing a two-car hauling trailer for sale.
“Check this bad boy out,” Masterson wrote.
The unit is no longer available.
On June 11, WSU’s director of financial reporting asked Masterson for a breakdown of GoCreate’s software costs for the FY26 university audit. Four days later, Masterson forwarded that message to his assistant director.
“Good morning Kim,” he wrote. “On a work note, could you please pull the info Mandy needs from us on software?”
On July 21, a WSU records custodian informed Masterson of an open records request the university had received for all of his work calendar entries from April 2026 to the present date, including meetings, events and appointments related to his official duties.
Masterson replied 10 days later on July 31, asking the university to wait to turn over his calendar records until after he could meet with his lawyer on Aug. 6 — two days after the primary election.
“Thanks for the opportunity to review this request before it goes out,” Masterson wrote. “I keep most of my work/personal calendar entries on my own private calendar. So I have additional records to provide regarding my WSU calendar items, but I’ll need to go through my calendars with my attorney to make sure any personal calendar (entries) are redacted.”
He said his lawyer was out of the country on a family vacation.
“I’d respectfully request the opportunity to provide these records before the calendar request is filled to make sure all of the records are provided at the same time and a complete picture is made available to the public,” Masterson wrote.
The final message he sent, on Aug. 3, was in response to a member of the university’s strategic communications division who told him that his WSU profile had been inadvertently removed during website maintenance and that she had drafted a replacement.
The draft biography stated that Masterson was a graduate of Kansas State University.
“It looks great with only 1 change needed,” Masterson wrote back the same day. “I never fully graduated from K-State, which interestingly enough has made me much more relatable and successful with our ‘non-traditional’ students and community members with the same life experience. God works in some amazing ways.”
GoCreate mentor’s perspective
More than 2,000 people have been GoCreate members since 2017, Masterson’s campaign said in July. Memberships are free for all WSU and WSU Tech students, according to GoCreate’s website.
Located inside the John Bardo Center, the makerspace includes a design studio, a tech lab, a 3D printing studio, and additional studios for textiles, wood and metals.
Bill Carey, an electrical engineer, has worked part-time as a mentor at GoCreate since the facility opened in 2017. He described his role as “feeding the vision” of people who walk through the doors.
“One of the people I’ve been working with wanted to start out on an electrical vehicle project and we just finished a conversion on an electric mower to a riding lawn mower,” Carey said.
His favorite part of the job is working with small businesses that are in the process of launching, he said.
Carey, who spends half a day each week at GoCreate, said he believes characterizing Masterson’s director role as a no-show job is unfair.
“I see him there on occasion coming through just in the half a day that I’m there,” Carey said. “My office is about thirty feet from his, so I see him when he comes by.”
He said working at GoCreate could equip someone with the tools they need to serve as governor.
“It all comes under the heading of learning how to work together with people and how to listen and kick ideas around with somebody and work through something that’s larger than what you know how to do,” Carey said.
As a research engineer, Carey said he’s grateful for the opportunities he’s had at GoCreate over the last decade.
“I just enjoy watching people — the lights come on and they get to say, ‘I really wish I could do this,’ and then you help them do it,” Carey said. “And they go, ‘Wow.’ And now you know how to do it, you can do it again. You can do something a little bit bigger.”
For him, it’s a passion project.
“I work there because I enjoy it,” Carey said. “It’s not because it pays a lot.”
Masterson’s compensation
The GoCreate director is set to receive a pay raise of more than $24,000 in 2027, bringing the position’s base salary to $241,781.
Masterson doesn’t plan to collect that pay. His campaign said in August that he would exit the director role permanently if voters let him assume control of the state’s executive branch.
Over the last decade, Masterson has received more than $1.1 million from WSU, including $163,000 in 2025, state records show. He has consistently taken unpaid leave when the Legislature is in session, cutting into his take-home pay.
Outgoing Gov. Laura Kelly received roughly $174,000 in compensation last year.
Masterson, who lives just outside of Wichita in Andover, has emphasized that no Kansas tax dollars are used to fund his GoCreate salary.
State Sen. Cindy Holscher of Overland Park, the Democratic nominee for governor, said Masterson’s WSU employment arrangement represents “pay-to-play politics at its worst, with wealthy special interests handing the most powerful man in the Legislature a paycheck that only keeps growing, for a fake job with no responsibilities.”
“We all know what they’re really paying for — influence,” Holscher said in a statement.
A spokesperson for Masterson’s campaign dismissed the criticism. Garrett Henson said that as governor, Masterson would “bring that same focus to every corner of the state” that he has as GoCreate director.
“Ty is proud of what GoCreate has built,” Henson said in a statement. “It’s a place where Kansans turn ideas into businesses, learn a trade and create jobs in their own communities.”
A WSU spokesperson declined to provide context for the GoCreate director’s pay increase, which is listed in the school’s Fiscal Year 2027 budget book.
“The university does not comment on personnel matters involving individual employees and does not disclose employee-specific compensation information beyond what is required by law,” spokesperson Lainie Mazzullo-Hart said in an email.
WSU also declined to say how many candidates applied for the GoCreate director job in 2016, saying that “given the age of the search, we cannot confirm whether records reflecting the number of applicants still exist.”
GoCreate funding
Citing an exemption to the Kansas Open Records Act that allows public agencies to withhold records related to charitable donations and relationships with nonprofit organizations, WSU declined The Star’s request for a breakdown of GoCreate program funding, including the source of employee salaries.
However, an analysis conducted by the Kansas Legislative Research Department and reviewed by The Star says the GoCreate director, like every other employee, is paid from an operational budget that “includes funding from the Koch (Family) Foundation and revenue generated by GoCreate streams,” such as rentals and membership fees.
A spokesperson for the Koch Family Foundation said the organization is “proud to support Wichita State’s GoCreate by helping provide community members access to workspace and entrepreneurship programming.”
“We are not involved in employment or compensation decisions,” the Koch spokesperson said in an email.
In July, WSU provided The Star a document that outlined the “essential functions” of the GoCreate director role, which include managing staff and resources, acquiring tools, building relationships with community members and industry partners, and pursuing philanthropic and grant funding opportunities.
Masterson said this summer that the flexible nature of the job allows him to work “on site a couple days a week.”
“Some weeks, I do two to three (days of in-person work) and some weeks I won’t,” he said in an interview after a June campaign stop in Wichita.
