Budget Battle
September 24, 2008
The budget battle for this year may have finally concluded: over the last week, the leaders of the legislature fell all over themselves to give the Governor concessions to create the final budget deal. The Governor signed the budget yesterday and there was no big ceremony. He “blue penciled”, a polite term for a line item veto, more than $500 million from the budget and trailer bills. The CSU was vulnerable as it is not protected, but was left untouched by the blue pencil. The Director of Finance noted it was untouched. One of the crueler cuts was the elimination of funding for the UC Labor studies programs. The final $5.4 million was cut by the Governor. The UC Labor Studies programs had been constant targets of Republicans over the past few years.
To make ends meet, the state will be counting on borrowing $5 billion from the lottery. Even with that borrowing, projections show that next year’s budget is already in the hole by at least $1.5 billion before we start--and the economy continues to fall. It’s probable that the Governor may revert to mid-year cuts, like he did last year, to jump-start budget discussions for the next cycle. Last year, those cuts were announced in his January budget proposal and the CSU was not included in the mid-year cuts.
Yes, here we go again!
The CSU Trustees are planning on a budget request that is based upon the compact and that would fund the CSU at a level consistent with the growth prior to this budget year. The final CSU budget request will be voted on at the November Board of Trustees meeting. Next year’s budget request can be found on page seven of the CSU Trustees Committee on Finance Agenda.
Although the request presents many challenges in this current economic climate, at least it is an attempt to ask for what the CSU needs. It is based upon an enrollment growth of 2.5 percent, consistent with the compact. The current economy has created a high demand for enrollment, as students stay in college a little longer due to the poor job market and as many people return to school to pick up additional skills.
The Alliance for the CSU will continue to press forward, advocating for a strong CSU budget while highlighting the positive impact of the CSU on the state of California. The $97 million restored by the May revise is still in the final budget; that would not have happened without the Alliance efforts, particularly the high quantity of faxes, emails and phone calls made to legislators in support of the CSU. We will need to regroup, refocus and redouble our efforts next year to save the CSU budget by increasing our outreach to and pressure on the legislators and the Governor.
To say that I am disappointed in the final budget outcome is an understatement. This budget solves nothing. There were some budget proposals that included revenue and the potential for growth budgets in the future without more deep cuts. The CSU needs a growth budget and revenues to meet the enrollment demand and to fund the compensation needs of its employees. So, we refine our messages and will be back at it again starting in January when the Governor announces his plans for the next fiscal challenge in the 2009-2010 budget.