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Budget deal boosts UW

July 27, 2001

A state budget deal reached this week includes full funding for the university’s BioStar building projects and a total of $23.8 million and 130 positions for the Madison Initiative public-private funding partnership.

The Legislature July 26 approved a state budget that sets priorities for spending state money over the next two years. The governor will likely take up to a month to review the bill and consider vetoes before signing it.

The Madison Initiative funding conists of $14 million in tax money and $9.8 million in tuition. The conference committee also agreed to authorize funding for all four BioStar buildings; and voted to remove the ban on embryonic stem cell and fetal tissue research that had been included in the Assembly version of the budget bill.

A detailed summary of items of interest to UW–Madison is available on the state relations Web site.

Among other highlights, the proposed budget would:

  • Delete $6 million in tax money and require the Board of Regents to increase out-of-state tuition by 2.5 percent per year to make up the difference.
  • Combine maintenance functions of the state and university vehicle fleets, cutting $151,400 tax money and three jobs from the UW–Madison fleet budget.
  • Restore $30 million in bonding authority for facilities maintenance and repair projects for the UW System for the 2003-2005 biennium. The building commission had recommended $40 million for this purpose.
  • Provide an additional $16.5 million in taxpayer-supported borrowing for the Mechanical Engineering Renovation and Addition project, but directs that the planning and design be done in 2001-03 and the construction be done in 2003-05.
  • Initiate planning and financing for a $20 million meat/muscle science laboratory and $23.6 million veterinary diagnostic laboratory, both at UW–Madison.
  • Provide $2.6 million (a 4.5 percent increase each year) for the Wisconsin Higher Education Grant for UW students and $951,900 (a 4.5 percent increase each year) for the Lawton minority undergraduate grant program and the Advanced Opportunity Program (AOP) grants for minority and economically disadvantaged graduate students.
  • Provide $900,000 for the minority precollege scholarship program, increasing the number of available scholarships by 1,500 to 6,600.
  • Require all four-year UW campuses to accept from Technical College transfer students all general education courses and courses covered in the credit transfer initiatives between the UW and Technical College System.
  • Create a two-year pilot program at UW–Madison to address the use of long-term LTE positions by converting 50 LTE positions into full-time classified positions. UW–Madison would be required to report to the Legislature in two years on how this program has reduced the use of LTE positions.

The Legislature agreed not to include a number of provisions that once were part of the budget, including a prohibition on the use of stem cells or fetal tissue for research.