UC Santa Cruz will need to cut between $7 million and $12.3 million from its 2008-2009 budget, Campus Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Dave Kliger told the Academic Senate Friday.
The low end is based on Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's revised May budget that restored $98.5 million from earlier proposed cuts. That budget would still reduce UC's budget by $234 million, Kliger said.
Uncertainty over the exact number could extend into summer depending on when the state finalizes UC funding, Kliger said. "We don't yet know how the Regents and the Office of the President will respond. But there is one thing that we know for certain--we must plan for cuts and move forward with some actions and not simply wait."
Chancellor Blumenthal noted that he and other college and university leaders have been lobbying the governor and legislature to maintain investment in higher education. And he spoke of continuing to move forward for a comprehensive fundraising campaign.
Academic Senate Chair Quentin Williams noted that "external sources of funding become more important."
Kliger said that despite the inevitable need to cut he wants to continue to invest in four areas: competitive salaries, large-scale computer capacity, infrastructure for a capital campaign, and expansion of research efforts in Silicon Valley.
With a unanimous vote and a standing ovation, the Academic Senate approved the nomination of Patricia Zavella, professor of Latin American and Latino Studies, to deliver the 2008-2009 Faculty Research Lecture.
The annual selection is a high honor as the nomination and vote come from one's colleagues. In its nomination, the Committee on the Faculty Research Lecture said Professor Zavella, who chairs the department, "is at the forefront of setting the research agenda on Latinos.
"Her groundbreaking work is widely respected for building the interdisciplinary and transnational agendas of anthropology, feminist studies, Latin American and Latino Studies and Chicano/a studies," the committee's nominating letter stated.
Two weeks ago, Zavella accepted on behalf of her department a Chancellor's Award for Achievements in Diversity.
Contact the author at lasnier@ucsc.edu.
