Brown assesses state of the university

The state budget cuts to university funding will continue through this semester and into next year, Chancellor Roger Brown said in his first annual State of the University Address Monday."Already we have received an advisory from the commissioner of finance from the state of Tennessee that due to the July and August business tax revenues falling even farther behind than was projected, we are mandated to prepare another budget that will include further cuts," Brown said.

These budget cuts can be attributed to lower-than-average tax revenues in the state of Tennessee, the chancellor said.

Departments are being asked to prepare an updated budget that includes a three to five percent cut in current spending, Brown said.

There is a possibility the state will ask the university to return more money from it's budget sometime midyear before next year's budget goes into effect, Brown said.

He said a systems financial officer told him several months ago that this midyear budget cut was not likely to happen, but with the continued tax revenue deficiencies, this remains a possibility in the coming months.

The University of Tennessee system budget has already been cut $22 million by the state, Brown said. Approximately $2.6 million was taken from UTC's budget this fiscal year.

"This is a very serious economic shortfall," Brown said. "The pessimistic outlook is that this cycle could go on for as many as four to five years before we are back to the 2007 level of business tax revenues in the state of Tennessee and therefore [back to] full funding."

Brown said the university is looking for ways to cut spending without "cutting ourselves to the bone" in some of the core areas of university operation.

The university has made it a priority to retain all faculty positions during the budget cuts, he said.

The state mandated that the university make these cuts from permanent spending and not one-time dollars, he said.

"We were told to be strategic and study where the least harm will come from those budget cuts," Brown said.

The reductions have been achieved primarily through the elimination of vacant positions and a reduction of operating support, the chancellor said.

The six percent increase in tuition this semester has helped to offset the cuts but did not come close to replacing the lost $2.6 million, Brown said. It was not practical to count on a raise in student tuition to completely negate the effects of the budget cut. University officials are making progress on initiatives designed to improve the university despite the decrease in funding, Brown said. Seven areas were identified and arranged in order of importance to the faculty, staff and community, he said. These areas are faculty and staff compensation, restoration of departmental operating budgets, equipment replacement, support for the library, position replacements, support for athletics and facilities support. Progress has been made in each of these areas except for compensation, Brown said."For the time being the state has flatly prohibited us [from allocating funds toward] compensation," Brown said.

Officials are, however, analyzing data and formulating a multi-year plan to bring faculty compensation to a competitive level, the chancellor said. Kaitlin Ewing, a freshman from Knoxville, said she does not know of a good way for the university to decrease its budget. "There is not really anything on campus that is so good that it can afford to have money taken away from it," Ewing said Brittany Holland, a freshman from Nashville, said she disagrees with the way the budget cuts are being handled. "I don't think it is exactly fair for the state to take money away from eduction," Holland said.

"We are paying a lot of money to go to school and I think that [the state] needs to contribute money because we deserve a quality education," Holland said.

Ewing and Holland said they did not know what programs the university should cut money from.

"That is a really hard decision to have to make," Holland said. "I don't know what I would decide if I were put in that situation."

"I don't think that [state officials] should take money away from education," Ewing said. "But I do not know where else that they could take that money from."

Holland said "I think that [$2.6 million] is a lot of money to take away from UTC and I don't see how the university can afford to lose that much money without it hurting students."

Ewing said: "I really appreciate that they are not going to fire any of the teachers. That wouldn't be fair. I guess not getting a raise is better than being fired although there have to be some teachers who deserve one.