More budget cuts possible

Assembly Republicans this week proposed UW System budget cuts totaling about $120 million.

The latest proposal would follow a decade in which the UW has sustained $55 million in base budget cuts, says UW System Board of Regents President Jay Smith.

The full Assembly is expected to take up Assembly Republican Caucus changes Thursday, March 14, after which the bill will be sent to the Senate. Senate leadership has asked the Senate Budget Committee to hold additional hearings on the budget before taking any action in their house.

Faced with likely sharp cutbacks, the UW System Board of Regents has suspended undergraduate admissions at all 26 campuses, pending additional information on proposed cuts to the UW System budget.

UW System President Katharine Lyall says the UW System must study the impact of budget cuts and how they will affect each campus.

To preserve the UW’s mission, “we have cut to the bone and beyond,” Smith asserts. Our university leaders “are talented managers, but they are not magicians,” he says.

The regents already say the UW System’s role as an engine of economic development for Wisconsin is in jeopardy. The UW “has been a catalyst for economic development,” observes Regent Roger Axtell.

These latest proposed cuts threaten to eliminate the UW’s ability to educate additional students in areas of greatest economic importance to Wisconsin, says Axtell, a former corporate executive.

Here is a rundown of the latest proposed cuts:

Agency reductions

The Assembly will consider measures that would:

Across the board cut to state agencies increases by another half-percent, equaling $4.6 million for UW System.
UW advertising budget cut by $4 million.
UW travel budget funded by state tax dollars cut 50 percent, or $8.5 million.
Study abroad grants eliminated (a total of $1 million).
Printing costs for all state agencies cut by 10 percent. However, it is possible that this cut may be absorbed in the across-the-board agency cuts.
Agencies required to lapse to the general fund 20 percent of the state tax dollar amounts spent in 2000-01 for the costs of memberships and dues in national, state and local nongovernmental organizations.

Employees

The Assembly will consider measures that would:

Require state employees to pay a minimum of $10 a month for individuals and $20 a month for families for their health insurance beginning next January.
Reduce compensation reserves for the state pay plan, essentially freezing reserves at 2001-02 levels and expecting state agencies to reallocate funds to fund salary increases scheduled for 2002-03.
Require state employees with appointments between half and three-quarter time who participate in the Wisconsin Retirement System to pay half of the nominal state contribution for benefits.
End the state subsidy of state employee income continuation insurance; the motion protects those currently receiving benefits however.
Cap state employment by allowing agencies to hire only 75 percent of the positions that become vacant in a given year.

Tuition/Financial Aid

The Assembly will consider measures that would:

Require an additional one-time 10 percent out-of-state student tuition surcharge, estimated to generate $9.4 million in tuition and cutting an equivalent amount of state tax funding.
Require students to pay the full cost of courses they retake, estimated to generate $5 million in tuition and cutting an equivalent amount of GPR funding.
Eliminate the state subsidy for students taking more than 165 credits, estimated to generate $6.7 million in tuition and cutting an equivalent amount of state tax funding.
Redistribute financial aid funding so that the increase to the Wisconsin Higher Education Grant program is 3.52 percent more than biennial budget levels. The governor’s budget adjustment bill provided for a 5.8 percent increase above the level set in the budget bill.
Maintain the Joint Finance Committee’s decision to cap UW System-wide resident undergraduate tuition increases at 8 percent instead of the 10 percent recommended by the governor. The difference to students is about $36 a semester, but results in a loss of about $10 million in student fees for the UW System.