The need for a State-level multipurpose finance authority was studied during the mid-1980s by the Special Commission on a Public Agenda for Kansas and by the Legislative Commission on Economic Development. The 1987 Kansas Legislature created KDFA through its enabling statues (K.S.A. 74-8901 et seq.) which provide for the creation of the Authority as a "...public body politic and corporate, with corporate succession, to be an independent instrumentality of this state exercising essential public functions..." to access the capital markets on behalf of state agencies, the Regents Institutions, and to provide conduit finance services to other public and private entities, including educational facilities, health care facilities, transportation facilities, manufacturing facilities, agricultural facilities, energy conservation facilities, and so forth.