The University submitted a proposal to the LSU System Office on Thursday, requesting the Board of Supervisors change a major policy that would make enforcing an involuntary furlough on faculty easier. Chancellor Michael Martin, along with other administrators, asked System President John Lombardi in late January if the University could consider imposing a mandatory furlough — a temporary, unpaid leave of absence — on faculty and staff to help cope with possible large budget cuts next fiscal year. “Their salaries would be reduced by the percentage of the time they are furloughed,” Martin suggested to Lombardi in a Jan. 20 e-mail obtained by The Daily Reveille. The Board of Supervisors currently requires the University to declare financial exigency — an actual or upcoming financial      crisis in which a university can no longer support its academic units at their current level — before applying furloughs, layoffs or terminations of tenured faculty, non-tenured faculty or other contract employees before the end of their contract. Martin told Lombardi in a Jan. 21 e-mail obtained by The Daily Reveille that even a budget reduction below the worst-case scenario level of 30 percent would cause the University to consider furloughs.”If the cut even approaches the 20 percent level it seems some rather dramatic actions will be called for,” Martin said in the e-mail. “Including furloughs and layoffs.”The issue of furloughing faculty was not included in the System’s “budget reduction exercise” — showing how the System would deal with cuts between 18 and 30 percent for the fiscal year beginning July 1 — submitted to the Division of Administration Feb. 4, but financial exigency was. “To terminate faculty would likely involve the necessity of the Board of Supervisors declaring financial exigency and implementation of a procedure to further evaluate and act,” the budget reduction exercise states. “Furthermore, financial exigency action is best implemented in relation to an actual budget reduction and not a range of potential budget cuts.”The proposal will have to be reviewed by Lombardi and other System officials before it is presented to the Board of Supervisors. System Spokesman Charles Zewe said it will likely not be a part of the Board’s upcoming March 5 meeting. It is undetermined when or if the proposal will go before the Board of Supervisors, who would ultimately need to approve the measure.—-Contact Kyle Bove at [email protected]