The University will cut approximately $9 million from its budget, after the State budget office ordered agencies to take out two percent of their planned spending, Provost Larry Nielsen said.
University officials received notice of the necessary cuts late last week, and Nielsen said he, Chancellor James Oblinger and Charles Leffler, vice chancellor for business and finance, have discussed the situation but have not made decisions on where to cut.
“We’ve called a special meeting of the University Budget Advisory Committee to get input,” he said.
The state is taking back money it had originally appropriated to state agencies because of the ailing economy, Nielsen said, after comparing the actual revenue the state has made to its projected revenue.
“They’re being cautious and holding back some of the money that was being planned in the budget,” he said.
Worries that the budget cuts could expand past the two-percent mark, depending on the state of the economy in the coming year are concerning, but Nielsen said it was better to find out in September than later in the school year.
“We can slow down spending now and pace it over the remainder of the year,” he said.
Johnny Wynne, dean and executive director for agricultural program, said he was uncertain how the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences will cut its budget because there are two budget codes.
For the academic programs budget, which Wynne said is under the provost, part of the money is state money and part is from tuition.
The biggest difficulty is that, like most colleges, almost all the money in the CALS budget is for faculty salaries, he said.
“Almost all our money is obligated,” Wynne said. “So when a cut comes, it’s difficult when you’ve got all your money tied up in salaries.”
Tony Harrison, professor and director of the graduate programs in English, said the budget’s focus on personnel would make it difficult to cut from.
“Many of the departments in the University have access to much greater pools of external funding than we do in the humanities and social sciences, so they have money returns from overhead that we have much less of,” he said. “Nobody likes to give up those kinds of funds.”
With less money to fund professors’ salaries, the cuts could make class sizes even larger, Brad Lacroix, a senior in history education, said.
“I don’t mind it as much, but a lot of people don’t like [larger class sizes],” Lacroix said.
Wynne said the state recommended different ways to save money to deal with a smaller budget, one being to stop active hiring.
“If any secretary or technician or student positions become available, we won’t fill them,” he said.
Wynne said CALS could also limit travel and delay any major purchases.
“Those are the three strategies that we have and that’s what the state budget office recommended,” he said.
While the cuts’ most likely victim is University personnel, Wynne said it will affect faculty conducting research on state money, purchasing certain equipment, and will restrict abilities to travel for meetings.
“It can affect all the functions,” he said.
