The same day UC President Mark Yudof issued his three-part proposal for salary cuts and furloughs, faculty leaders from various campuses sent a memo of their own.

Leaders of faculty unions at UCLA, UCSD and UCSF sent a letter Wednesday to the UC Board of Regents, criticizing the university's and the board's preparation for the system's unprecedented $800 million budget shortfall.

In the letter, they wrote that the board had "no serious discussion" at its May 7 meeting about the implications of the May 19 statewide special election, where the failures of the revenue-generating propositions nearly doubled the UC deficit.

The UC system may need to restructure the way it is run and teaches, the letter said.

"Our top administrators candidly admit that the magnitude of the cutbacks in state funding were not anticipated until quite recently," the letter states.

UC spokesperson Ricardo Vasquez said Yudof and other UC officials have tried to be as clear and open as possible about what the UC system is facing.

"It's really not surprising to us that people are raising concerns because the budget crisis is enormous," he said.

Dwight Read, a UCLA anthropology professor and chair of the UCLA Faculty Association who signed the letter, said he and others decided to send the letter because they are hearing "vague statements" about what the system faces.

"We believe that this crisis is not a short-term budget shortfall, but is a long-term change in funding that will require restructuring and rethinking what is needed for the UC system to maintain academic excellence," he said in an e-mail.

Though UC and campus officials have said that they will fight to maintain the quality of education, faculty from all campuses have said academic quality will be compromised because of proposed cuts to faculty pay and benefits.

Many have said the cuts will make it harder for campuses to retain and attract faculty and may result in fewer classes and shorter semesters.

In Yudof's proposal for furloughs and salary cuts for both faculty and staff sent Monday, he laid out three options for the board to review at its July 14 to 17 meeting, which could trim close to $200 million off the system's deficit.

The three options are an 8 percent salary cut, 21 days of unpaid furloughs or a combination of a 3.4 percent salary cut and 12 days of furloughs.

Christine Rosen, an associate professor in the Haas School of Business and president of the Berkeley Faculty Association, said the campus may try to schedule furlough days on normally paid holidays and could even shorten semesters.

"To adjust, we will all have to restructure our courses and figure out what to cut out, which can be extremely difficult and painful," she said in an e-mail.

For staff, hiring freezes and layoffs will force employees to do more work for less, said Tanya Smith, local president of the University Professional and Technical Employees union.

"President Yudof's proposals are not framed to support people who are working people," she said.

Tags: UC BOARD OF REGENTS