STUDENT LIFE ‘mdash; Last week, Chancellor Marye Anne Fox addressed UCSD’s $16 million deficit at a town-hall meeting, proposing cuts to a slew of campus programs to tighten spending. Among promises to maintain academic excellence, campus health and diversity initiatives, Fox offered short-term reduction solutions that included a voluntary employee buyout program, suspending academic enrichment programs and reducing recruitment and hiring.
While administrators said UCSD’s immediate cuts are almost identical to those made during past economic hardships, few concrete long-term solutions have been determined.
‘What do we do if this carries on for another year or two?’ Senior Vice Chancellor Paul W. Drake said at the meeting. ‘We’re going to need more innovative, probably systemwide solutions to continue to cope with it.”
Although recent proposals may come from a list unearthed from UCSD’s emergency-recession kit, our campus’ current financial difficulties won’t mimic those from previous downturns. In a historic state financial crisis and a failing world economy, the deficits presented to administrators are not brief hiccups in our system’s funding. Saving methods by which administrators hope to salvage our campus’ most important programs shouldn’t be considered temporary, nor should they rest on outdated plans.
One of the university’s most specific plans to reduce costs is by offering a voluntary Staff and Academic Reduction in Time program in which employees can reduce their working hours and corresponding pay between 10 percent and 50 percent. While the S.T.A.R.T. program that ran from June 2003 to July 2006 provided $41.9 million in systemwide savings, it was offered in a healthy economic climate. Credit and mortgage markets weren’t collapsing and California’s employment rate hadn’t reached a 15-year high of 9.3 percent. With a much more serious threat to personal financial stability, fewer employees are likely to participate in the program.
Because the university’s lack of funds prevent it from offering early retirement to remove employees from payroll, it should consider severance packages. Rather than expecting financial woes to fizzle, UCSD must avoid rushed dismissals when the going gets tougher and begin a comprehensive analysis of which positions can most easily be eliminated to avoid haphazard action. Consolidating responsibilities so there are more employees under one supervisor and cutting smaller administrative assistant positions may cause initial strain, but encouraging’ direct communication within departments would streamline administrative efforts and remove bureaucratic middlemen.
To prevent reactionary cuts that come with recurring financial instability we should consider a permanent budget evaluation program to assess departments biannually. UCSD is currently involved in reducing energy costs through sustainability efforts and integrating resource conservation into each individual department would create energy and administrative efficiency.
It’s no doubt UCSD is quickly reducing department expansion, but there’s a difference between halting growth and slashing the resources we’re comfortable with. If we can expect any sort of stable future for our campus, we’re going to have to brace ourselves and take a lasting step out of our comfort zone.
Readers can contact Alyssa Bereznak at [email protected].