In the wake of mid-year budget cuts, University instructors will gather in funeral attire aside the University’s Sesquincentenial kick-off ceremony to protest budget cuts and further job terminations. Dubbed “Memorial Service for LSU,” the memorial is in protest to the 13 layoffs, 153 unfilled positions and funding cuts to all major colleges’ administrative departments which are the result of the third budget cut the University has suffered in a year. The memorial is scheduled for noon on Tuesday at the flagpole on the Parade Ground.The protest also follows as many as 400 instructors being informed by the University that the termination of their jobs is a possibility within the next year. The University’s Baton Rouge campus has shaved $12.6 million from its midyear fiscal budget in response to a state funding shortfall. The LSU System as a whole is cutting $39.1 million with the Baton Rouge campus receiving the deepest wounds.”My first reaction was, ‘This is getting really painful,'” Chancellor Michael Martin said. “We have largely avoided major pain up to now, but this one was incrementally large enough that pain has come, and that is unfortunate.”Martin said cuts could lead to larger classes, difficulty scheduling and a decrease in the quality of services offered to students.Facility Services bears the brunt of the layoffs with eight positions terminated. Finance and Administrative Services suffered two lost positions.The College of Education is the only school within the University forced to issue layoff notices, costing three positions.The three job terminations were administrative support staff and minimize the effects on student support, College of Education Dean M. Jayne Fleener said in an e-mail to The Daily Reveille.Besides layoffs, the University announced it is eliminating 153 funded but currently vacant positions ranging from more than 60 educator positions, numerous administrative positions and faculty service positions, saving the University more than $5.5 million.To compound the cuts, each college is receiving a funding cut averaging 4 percent of its yearly budget. Eric Monday, associate vice chancellor for Finance and Administrative Services, said the cuts to individual college budgets range from 2.5 to 6 percent of each budget. “We have decided to stress administration first and stress the academic units later, but now the stress is going to be felt,” Martin said.Faculty Senate President and English professor Kevin Cope said students will soon see fewer sections and larger classes. These midyear budget cuts have left higher education across the state reeling, but what awaits in the coming months has Martin disheartened and the University preparing for more layoffs.Higher education in Louisiana expects to take about $150 million in cuts during the next fiscal year because of a forecasted $1.9 billion shortfall in state funds in the next two fiscal years.Deans have been meeting with professors to inform them they could lose their job in the next year, according to a University news release on Thursday.Cope said the University will be sending out between 300 and 400 letters this week informing professors their employment could be terminated in a year’s time.Cope said he believes the University is doing what is legally obligated in preparation for future cuts. University spokesman Herb Vincent would not confirm any plans to send such notifications.Martin said administrators have started the process of evaluating whole units for closing before the legislative session, which begins in late March.”Between now and the beginning of the legislative session, we intend to close some stuff,” Martin said. “Not just sand, not just plane and not just chip away at the margins, but make some hard choices about making LSU a narrower institution so it can remain deep.”Martin said the budget outlook necessitates taking a strategic approach to further cuts instead of trimming from each department.
“We are trying to protect the core and build degrees of freedom in the event we hit another big cut,” Martin said. “If I was a betting person, I would be inclined to bet on another cut. And if there is another cut … the cut will not be trivial.”
Martin said he believes majors and entire programs will “disappear” in the next 12 to 18 months.–Contact Xerxes A. Wilson at [email protected]