The University of California Office of the President announced plans to shrink down its operations by $50 million and shift the savings to individual UC campuses.
Each campus will gain more autonomy and control over its own revenue as a result, said UC President Mark Yudof. UCOP will ask for a fixed amount from each campus every year and the campus will be able to determine where the funds come from.
UCLA is at an advantage over other campuses because of its broad range of funding sources, said Nathan Brostrom, vice president of business operations. He pointed to the medical center and research grants as examples.
Brostrom promised more details about the program, which will also propose cuts to certain types of research grants. In the short term, the plan will reduce the projected $96 million reduction in state funding to UCLA for next year.
Administrative downsizing was overshadowed by a list of grim scenarios for the long-term fiscal outlook of the UC. University officials detailed a multi-billion-dollar deficit through the next four years.
A hanging uncertainty is whether Gov. Jerry Brown will be able to get his package of tax extensions on the ballot before voters in June. The California legislature has yet to conclude a vote on the budget nearly a week after Brown’s original deadline. Republican legislators have steadfastly opposed the measure in media reports.
But failure of the tax extensions will result in roughly double cuts to the UC, from the current $500 million to as much as $1 billion. That means enrollment reductions or tuition hikes “”mdash; or both.
In an interview last week, Yudof said he would not endorse the measure without first seeing the language. He said he is concerned about permanent limitations on higher education spending.
Patrick Lenz, vice president of budget and capital resources, said the consensus among the regents at the end of the day was to protect enrollment.
But, he added, “enrollment is not free.”
In a presentation to the board, Lenz pointed out the tuition increases that would be required to close an estimated $1.5 billion gap, assuming different levels of state funding. Without any state funding, annual tuition increases of 18 percent would hit the books, according to the graph.
While an extreme example, Student Regent-Designate Alfredo Mireles said it put the problem in perspective.
Regent Richard Blum argued the only way out of the budget crisis is to charge high tuition while offering high financial aid.
That would mean turning the UC down a path taken by private, nonprofit universities years ago, which would be a transition in public policy, said Kenneth Green, founder of the Campus Computing Project and a UCLA alumnus.
Green recently conducted one of the largest surveys of American college and university presidents to date with the online newspaper Inside Higher Ed, called “Presidential Perspectives.”
The survey found that presidents of public institutions generally felt disillusioned with methods used to solve budget problems, he said.
“(They said), this is all stuff tried before,” he said.