RIVER FALLS — A University of Wisconsin regent called the state Legislature’s delay on a final state budget “unnecessary” at a Board of Regents meeting Friday morning.
Regent Danae Davis, who chairs the regents' Education Committee, urged the Budget Conference Committee to "flex that leadership and get it done."
Davis’ comments come as the full Board of Regents passed a resolution telling state legislators exactly what it thinks about the current budget situation.
The resolution, which passed unanimously, called for the state to fund the UW System's normal inflationary costs and to make a significant investment in the Wisconsin Growth Agenda, which is a plan intended to bring access and affordability to UW students and result in economic growth in the state.
“I think it's having a dire consequence — especially on morale — of those who are responsible for educating our students and on our students and on their parents based on the uncertainty," Davis said.
Davis added without a budget, the UW System faces an array of issues, including class availability and financial aid.
"I'm hoping, hoping, hoping that reasonable minds are going to come to a conclusion real soon," Davis said. "I'm thinking we need certainty, especially when we're riding on really strong support from the public in support of the Growth Agenda."
UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley, who was in River Falls for the meeting, told The Badger Herald he has already taken steps in case the UW System is funded below its needs.
"We're in a tough spot right now, and I already told every dean and director of the Madison campus to give me their contingency plans if we don't get a budget by the end of the year," Wiley said.
In the contingency plans, Wiley said, deans and directors were asked to report what they planned to cut to absorb their share of what would be a $36 million shortfall.
"I think it's outrageous that one of the most important things legislators are expected to do is pass a budget, and here we are going into the second quarter of the fiscal year without a budget," Wiley said.
Wiley added starting July 1, UW System universities started paying 2007-08 bills, which were approved by the Legislature, which are higher due to inflation, and that the schools "don't have one penny of new money to pay for it."
"So every day without a budget, we go into debt, and it can't continue," Wiley said. "Some of [the legislators] are saying, ‘That's OK, it doesn't matter that we don't have a budget, we can just drift on last year’s budget.' Well, that's just outrageous to me."
Regent President Mark Bradley said next month, the budget indecision will directly affect all UW System students.
"Students are going to be enrolling for second semester in early November, so the whole question for each chancellor is: Do we assume we are going to have a certain level of funding?" Bradley said.
Specifics that cannot be finalized without a budget include what classes will be taught spring semester and how many sections of each class will be available, Bradley said.
Bradley said UW System chancellors agreed “a good estimation of what would happen if there's no budget is that there would be a 10 to 12 percent reduction in class offering for second semester."
"Yesterday was a litany of all the problems we've faced. It's a cascading set of issues when you are just unable to plan," Bradley said. "There's no economic model for any state that shows a way to grow in this knowledge economy that does not assume a strong public higher education system."
