FAYETTEVILLE — The University of Arkansas at Fayetteville will cut nearly $2.7 million from its budget for the current fiscal year, administrators said Tuesday.
The reduction is the university’s second for the 2010 fiscal year, which ends June 30. In total, UA officials have had to slash more than $5 million of expected state appropriations in less than four months.
The most recent cut is part of a statewide plan to trim $106 million from publicprograms, announced Monday by Gov. Mike Beebe.
“Although we have been able to weather the economic storm much better than many of our peers nationally to date, this cut will pose dire challenges that directly threaten our mission as a major academic and economic engine for the state,” Chancellor G. David Gearhart said in a news release.
UA began its fiscal year July 1 with a publicly funded budget of $270,892,850, up 3.4 percent over its revised budget for the previous year.Known as the Educational and General Fund, this budget segment is composed of tuition and state appropriations.
Gearhart and Don Pederson, vice chancellor of finance and administration, were in Little Rock on Tuesday, discussing with legislators potential budget shortfalls for the next fiscal year.
Associate Vice Chancellor Tysen Kendig said UA leadership will meet with the faculty and staff senates, along with academic department chairmen, in the next week to determine what programs to reduce or drop.
He could not completely rule out possible staff reductions, though he said cuts through attrition and mandatory, unpaid furloughs for faculty and staff likely would be considered first.
“Obviously, any direct impact on personnel and their individual pocketbooks would be a last-resort measure,” Kendig said. “Having a mid-year cut certainly exacerbates the situation because you have less time to absorb that shortfall.”
Some cuts to academic and outreach programs may be necessary, and the UA likely will institute a hiring freeze, he said.
The university’s Affordability and Cost Containment Commission, led by Pederson, already has eliminated about $12.5 million in spending in the past year by reducing energy use, administrative expenses and other line items. In the process, the commission eliminated the vice chancellor for student affairs position.
Further cuts may have a more noticeable impact onclassroom and research experiences for students and faculty, Kendig said.
“There really isn’t too much to cut,” he said. “It’s sort of like amputating a limb to try to lose weight. It’s a bad way to do business.”
The UA likely will have to raise tuition next year to prepare for further belt-tightening and avoid sacrificing crucial programs, Kendig said. This school year was the first in 24 years the Fayetteville campus held tuition at the same level as the previous year, counting on enrollment increases to help balance the budget.
A combination of tuition and state appropriations form 91 percent of the UA budget. As state appropriations dwindle, tuition will have to take their place, Gearhart said.
Plant pathology professor John Rupe, vice chairman of the faculty senate, said the group was most concerned with maintaining teaching assistants and other resources to keep the classroom experience the same for students.
“As faculty, what we’re concerned about is that we are able to continue to do our teaching at the level that we do it now,” he said.
Potential furloughs are “not something we like to think about, of course, but it’s something that’s gone on at other institutions across the country,” Rupe said. “We’ve been lucky to this point.”
After the first $2.4 million cut in October, the UA reduced raises for classified workers and eliminated plans to provide a one-time holidaystipend for employees who aren’t governed by the state’s classified pay scale, such as professors and administrators.
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Northwest Arkansas, Pages 9 on 01/13/2010