SAN FRANCISCO — With the recently approved fee increases covering only a little more than a quarter of the budget deficit for the University of California, talk at the Thursday meeting of the UC Board of Regents focused on a wide range of alternatives for dealing with the remaining budget shortfall as well as contingencies should an additional $100 million be cut from the UC midyear.
Plans presented at the board meeting Thursday were widely varied, with some already in implementation and others being put forward for consideration. The board and UC officials emphasized the need to keep “all options on the table” in order to address the budget shortfall.
“I asked to look at every single possible alternative,” said board chair Sherry Lansing in a press conference after the meeting. “That’s what today was all about.”
Without the revenue generated from fee increases, the overall UC deficit sits at just over $1 billion — a $650 million reduction in state support as well as around $362.5 million in unfunded mandatory cost increases. The fee hikes — one approved in November and one approved on Thursday — cover a little more than 26 percent of the gap, leaving an overall deficit of around $747 million.
At the meeting, options were presented that would be able to partially reduce the impact of state cuts in the short-term as well as long-term alternatives that could generate cost savings and revenue enhancements.
According to an action item for the meeting, as a result of budget cuts, actions that have already been taken by campuses include layoffs, consolidation and elimination of programs, increased class sizes, delayed faculty hires, reduced levels and hours of service and delayed purchase of necessary equipment.
Plans currently being implemented also include the Working Smarter Initiative, a systemwide administrative efficiency initiative which aims to produce savings of $500 million over five years. The program has already generated $157 million in savings over the last year.
Increasing nonresident enrollment was also presented as a means for addressing the budget shortfall.
According to UC officials, the university will likely increase nonresident undergraduate enrollment by about 2,000 students.
However, at the meeting, UC officials emphasized that it was important to make clear that enrolling more nonresident students allows the university to serve more California resident students, not fewer.
“By taking out-of-state students, we are actually able to sustain, and in some cases increase, the number of in-state students,” Lansing said at the meeting.
“We’re actually able to use the extra funding to increase the quality of education as well as the diversity. That’s really, I think, important for all of us to hear.”
In addition to plans already being implemented, options for future consideration were presented at the meeting, including differential tuition by campus, differential tuition by discipline and campus specialization. According to the presentation by UC officials, options not under consideration at this time include income-based tuition and enrollment reductions.
In addition to addressing this year’s shortfall, should the UC be cut up to an additional $100 million midyear, these alternatives would also be applied, according to an agenda item for the meeting.
If the entire $100 million reduction occurred, an additional 5.9 percent increase in fees would be required to cover the cut, according to the agenda item.
Although talk of the increase was tabled at Thursday’s meeting, UC officials have stated that in the event of further cuts, all options are being considered.
“We’re not going to take anything off the table, but we have been planning for a number of alternatives,” said Nathan Brostrom, UC executive vice president for business operations, in a press conference after the meeting.
Aaida Samad is an assistant news editor.
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University
of California Berkeley Chancellor Robert J Birgeneau
($500,000 salary), displaces qualified for public university education at Cal.
Californians with $50,600 FOREIGN students.
Ranked # 70 by Forbes, the University of California
Berkeley is not increasing enrollment. $50,600 FOREIGN students are accepted by
Birgeneau at the expense of qualified instate students.
Your opinions make a difference; email UC Board of
Regents [email protected]
“… $362.5 million in unfunded mandatory cost increases”
An accounting of why that is the case is in order.
Go ask Brostrom how much of it is simply interest on debt,
he ought to know, he’s the muni-bond fraud master.
Well, some of it is likely to be interest payments, but there are plenty of other increased costs. When you pay $4 for a gallon of gas, remember that UC also has to buy gas and heating oil for ten campuses and numerous field stations. The cost of providing health insurance is going up everywhere; UC has no exemption. When workers are laid off, they have to receive severance pay. Our legislature isn’t providing funding for any of this.
The “Working Smarter Initiative”?
Take a look:
http://tinyurl.com/3z5nymy
At last we are seeing the outcomes of 20+ years of Sacto Lib mismanagement of Cali. Rampant socialism, open borders, sanctuary cities, anti business regs and tax policy. Keep voting for your
Lib reps and watch Cali become a failed state.
It used to be that in-state student tuition was subsidized by the state, while out-of-state / international students would pay the ‘full cost’ of their education. Now while the state subsidy decreases and the total fees for all students increase, educating out-of-state and international students is clearly a profit-generating activity for the university (so are the $50,000/year Law and MBA programs).
What we’re already seeing, and we’ll probably see more of in the future, is an increasing tension between the ‘public’ and ‘private’ side of the university, so to speak. The ‘private’ side of the university, now charging a tuition comparable to Harvard and Stanford, is competing more directly with the privates, which means the need to spend more in facilities etc. to attract students, in turn driving up the costs of operation, creating a need for more revenue, and further squeezing out the public side.
“By taking out-of-state students, we are actually able to sustain, and
in some cases increase, the number of in-state students,” Lansing said
at the meeting.
‘In some cases’ is purposely vague. Unless we see actual figures, there’s good reasons to be skeptical of the idea that more out-of-state students will increase in-state enrollment. Many campuses are at capacity, or in the case of Berkeley – the campus that will likely attract the most non-residents – over capacity. Since the total enrollment cannot increase for these campuses, out-of-state students will displace in-state students.
Also, non-resident tuition revenue stays on the campus, so more out-of-state students at Berkeley won’t generate more revenue for the campuses that could expand and take more in-state students, and I doubt Berkeley would agree to some sort of new redistributive system to achieve that.
Maybe a small increase could be achieved by admitting more in-state students as transfer students rather than freshmen, but that’s just shifting the burden to community colleges.
You’re treating this as a permanent policy. It’s an emergency measure during the State’s sudden loss of revenue. When the Legislature is again willing to subsidize California students, UC will admit them.