Alexx Sanchez
asanch16@uwyo.edu
Governor Matt Mead released his biennial budget proposal, which will make significant cuts to the university, as a letter to the members of the 63rd Legislature.
In this letter Mead said the state has seen a tight budget coming due to the fall in energy prices and action will need to be taken to balance out the budget.
“At present, less revenue is projected for the fiscal year, which ends June 30, 2016, than was appropriated,” Mead said. “This means we must reduce from amounts appropriated to have a balanced budget for this year.”
Rather than across the board cuts, Mead said he is recommending a strategic reduction by looking at different programs to make them more efficient and to find appropriations to set aside. Mead did this by asking agency heads to submit frugal budgets.
“For FY 2016, I set aside prior appropriations of more than $159 million. Nearly $15 million of this amount is from vacancy savings from the hiring freeze I implemented this fall,” Mead said. “The $159 million balances the budget for the current fiscal year.”
For the fiscal year 2017 to 2018 Mead is recommending the standard budget be reduced by $19 million.
Along with these budget cuts, Mead has also proposed the state uses part of the Legislative Stabilization Reserve Account (LSRA) or otherwise known as the “rainy day fund.”
Representative Cathy Connolly, D-Laramie, spoke up about what she thought about Mead’s proposal to draw from the LSRA.
“The governor’s budget proposal provides the framework for the Joint Appropriations Committee (JAC) to begin its work. The governor responded to the downturn in anticipated revenues to the state by tapping into the LSRA,” Connolly said. “I believe this is an appropriate move, as his suggestion to capture a diversion to savings to allow for an additional $203.4 million for needed spending.”
Connolly continued by discussing how she thought the state could do more in terms of capturing automatic savings to make those funds available for the needed costs of state government.
With this new budget proposal the university will be facing funding cuts.
“The governor’s budget for UW is $482 million including $69 million in exception requests [the university asked for additional $155 million.] While the governor did include funds for some of the university’s additional requests, his budget also decreased the Block grant by $5 million,” Connolly said.
The $5 million cut will significantly impact the university as a whole, and Connolly said she hopes the original funding amount can be returned. The funding does not include raises for staff and faculty.
Connolly said she believes this could hurt retention rate and future recruitment for the university.
Additionally, there has been controversy about the amount of funding the athletic department will be receiving.
“We need to invest in athletics, just as we invest in all areas critical to UW,” Mead said. “I recommend $8 million general fund for athletics competitiveness to be matched dollar-for-dollar by private contributions.”
Connolly said she generally supports athletics, but she cannot support increased funding especially at the expense of meeting the core educational mission of the university.
“I will resist the exception request of $8 million in matching funds for athletic competitiveness while the university’s Block grant for its educational mission has been reduced by $5 million,” she said.
However, there are others that believe there is not enough funding being spent on the athletics in comparison to other universities.
Chris Boswell, vice president for governmental and community affairs, discussed how spending in athletics has changed dramatically in the past year.
“The NCAA has authorized a significantly broadened realm of spending that is allowable associated with students and our competitors in the Mountain West are absolutely plowing a lot of money into their programs,” Boswell said. “If we want to be competitive at the Mountain West Level then it’s likely that we have to do the same thing and so the governor’s recommendation is greatly appreciated.”
Besides the proposed cuts and tapping into the LSRA Mead recommended to expand Medicaid.
“If optional Medicaid expansion is adopted in Wyoming, the Department of Health could fund all of its requests without additional general fund dollars and free up additional dollars reducing its standard budget by $9.7 million,” Mead said.
Mead said this would allow $268 million of additional federal funds to flow into Wyoming.
“I applaud the Governor’s inclusion of Medicaid expansion. This is necessary for the 17,000 people in the state who would benefit, as well as local hospitals, and will return millions to the state,” Connolly said.
The proposal letter can be viewed as a Google document and can be found on Mead’s office page under legislative documents.
