Anthony Rodd
arodd@uwyo.edu
The University of Wyoming Budget Committee met Wednesday to discuss the most recent Consensus Revenue Estimate Group (CREG) report published by the Wyoming Department of Administration and Information.
The CREG report, composed by representatives from the Department of Revenue, Legislative Research Department and one consulting economist each from the University of Kansas, Kansas State University and Wichita State University, is the Wyoming Governor and state legislature’s go-to economic forecast report for developing budget spending.
The UW Board of Trustees, primarily the budget committee, uses this report to develop the university budget.
The CREG report is nearly 20 pages of tables and terms, all pointing to the needs of the state to cut costs. The budget committee discussed this, as well as conversation about infrastructural costs, costs of exigency, campus construction, even janitors and the size of the motor vehicle fleet on campus.
The major topic of discussion was indirect costs for the university, or costs concerning federal and private research grants.
Rick Miller, vice president of the UW General Counsel, and Bill Gern, vice president of the Office of Research and Economic Development (the same office that manages EPSCoR and INBRE), explained to the budget committee what indirect costs are and how they work.
The policy regarding indirect costs is for the most part not written down except in board of trustees minutes from 1978.
“Because our policy is stuck in a 1978 set of board minutes, people think ‘well there’s this money, but how does it work?’” Miller said.
Essentially, there is a history of policies concerning indirect costs that are in board minutes and nobody, including the board of trustees, really understands fully how they work
“Once the money comes to UW the trustees should budget for it – they should say, ‘Yeah, we know what is going on,’ but they can’t, not because we won’t tell them but because it all is really in the dust-bin of history,” Miller said.
The budget committee made it a crucial point at the meeting to begin writing the University of Wyoming policy concerning indirect research costs, in order to aid in restructuring the budget.
Miller said it is important for incoming professors to be able to read the indirect cost policy.
“You ought to be able to go online and read that, and if you’re a new faculty member, boy-howdy should you, because that would ultimately be helpful for you and your career,” Miller said.
The budget committee also plans on looking at the insurance cost policy and retirement policy.
The budget committee did not discuss the science initiative due to time constraints.
