As the University continues to be vigilant of its ever-fluctuating budget, financial hardships from 30 years ago are still taking their toll on campus facilities.

In the 1980s, the state saw a comparative budget shortfall, and the University was required to push back funding for several operating systems in academic buildings across campus, like the electrical and mechanical systems that were in need of repair.

Tony Lombardo, executive director of Facility Services, said many of the systems in today’s buildings are the same ones on which maintenance had to be deferred three decades ago.

“That’s why these budget situations are so devastating, because we’re climbing out of a hole, not moving the University forward,” Lombardo said.

The state has its own category of funding to combat this deferred maintenance, detailed in House Bill 2, which deals with the allocation of capital outlay. This funding is tied to a statewide conditions assessment, or a document that details the state of all public facilities.

But that assessment hasn’t been updated since the buildings’ initial evaluation in 2005.

The VFA, an international facilities assessment and consulting firm, was hired by the state that year to assess all state-owned buildings, including those at the University, and to compile a report ranking the buildings’ facilities on a scale of 1 to 5.

The VFA did so and listed items in need of repair, a suggested action dates for maintenance and an estimated cost for repairs. But this “to-do” list has since remained stagnant, allowing problems to fester and estimated maintenance bills to grow.

The assessment report indicates the University would have to fork over more than $255 million to bring all of the buildings up to current standards. That cost increases annually with the inflation of construction materials and the continued deterioration of the buildings.

Ken Courtade, manager of Long Range Planning at the University and former member of the state’s office of Facility Planning and Control, said the state contract with the VFA expires in June, but the state still isn’t sure whether it wants the specific detailed information the VFA report offers or another more general assessment.

“The more detailed plan gets down to more what the students are affected by — furniture, fixtures, finishes, carpeting, wall painting, windows, ceilings, floors,” he said. “It’s the smaller things that really are the aesthetics of the building and not just the operating systems.”

If the state used a systems audit for the basis of funding, Courtade said some of the smaller projects may go unfunded since state funding is tied to a statewide conditions assessment.

Michael DiResto, state director of communications and strategic initiatives, said in an e-mail that Facility Planning and Control is still trying to figure out which information is most vital to the facilities.

He said most facilities weren’t using the specific detailed data obtained through the report. The new contract would possibly allow individual facilities to pay for this detailed information if they wanted to use it, according to DiResto.

Regardless of what happens, Courtade said a change is needed.

Every year the total cost needed to update the buildings increases by about 5 percent, he said, and the state doesn’t give the University funding to combat this inflation.

That means by 2016, the University’s total cost of deferred maintenance will total about $322.4 million without any state assistance, Courtade estimated, not including roofs or non-assessed structures.

But DiResto argued Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration has invested more than $600 million for repair and construction projects for higher education facilities across the state since 2008.

“For LSU’s Baton Rouge campus alone, infrastructure and construction investments have totaled close to $43 million,” DiResto said in an e-mail.

DiResto said it is up to the individual institutions to determine which projects to submit for capital outlay funding requests.

However, Lombardo said the University’s funding request goes through a number of changes after the University submits it.

“You never know whether or not our priorities get funded until House Bill 2 comes out,” Lombardo said.

Courtade said the University hasn’t received funds from the state for deferred maintenance in a number of years. He’s unsure if this year will be any different.

In order to make up for financial shortfalls, the University must compensate in other areas to keep the University’s mission intact, according to Robert Kuhn, associate vice chancellor of Budget and Planning.

Kuhn said many budget cuts get pushed onto Facility Services to prevent tuition increases or cuts to faculty and classes offered.

“It’s just like in your home,” Kuhn said. “If the roof falls in, then you fix the roof. Unfortunately, that’s how deferred maintenance moves to the top of the list.”

If the condition of the facilities goes unchecked, then it could potentially shut down the University, according to Kuhn. If a building were uninhabitable, classes wouldn’t be able to be held there, leaving nowhere else for the classes to be taught, he said.

Courtade said he doesn’t foresee the problem being resolved any time soon. He expects the

University will have to prioritize which buildings to fund.

“There are programs that are part of the Flagship Agenda that the University has deemed them to have a certain importance to the mission of the University,” Courtade said. “You have to focus more on the facilities that service those, as compared to a program that’s not part of that. And that’s an unfair thing to say.”

This is the third in a three-part series detailing the state of the University’s academic buildings, which have not been evaluated since 2005.