Jindal budget plan will devastate LSU

[blitzen]

Below is the text of an e-mail that the LSU Chancellor just sent to the university community. Jindal can't blame this on the economy: Louisiana is doing okay (net job growth in 2008, low unemployment), and Baton Rouge is doing fine, since it didn't have much of a housing bubble. This is all Jindal's CHOICE--to give a huge tax break to business while cutting Higher Ed. Meanwhile the lying weasle claims to support Higher Ed and to care about the state's long-term well-being.



To: LSU Faculty, Staff and Students
From: Chancellor Mike Martin
Re: Budget Update

Today the governor’s preliminary executive budget was presented to the Legislature with a general 15 percent cut to higher education through the Board of Regents. However, the budget did not give details about cuts to LSU or other universities. Therefore, the latest guidance that we have is from the LSU System, which estimates a $34.8 million cut for LSU. This is in addition to the $10.5 million cut LSU already took mid-year.

The announcement of this latest cut is especially painful since LSU has made great strides in recent years. Many of you are aware that LSU finally broke into the top tier of U.S. News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” list in August. This prestigious ranking was, in part, the result of your hard work implementing LSU’s Flagship Agenda and of the Legislature funding LSU at the Southern regional average for the past two years.

Unfortunately, a cut of this magnitude will have a severe affect on our university. As I have said, this type of cut would be as if the Flagship Agenda never happened. Here are some possibilities we have outlined that LSU may see with the budget cut, returning us to a pre-Flagship Agenda era:

- A loss of $45 million returns LSU to about its 2005-06 (pre-Hurricane Katrina/Rita) state appropriated budget.
- By not filling vacant faculty positions, we will likely increase LSU’s faculty-to-student ratio.
- Budget cuts could mean significantly fewer graduate assistants – as low as 2003 levels – and post-doctoral researchers – as low as 2002 levels.
- The cuts could mean little or no progress on deferred maintenance of classrooms, research labs, buildings and other facilities. The backlog is now at $200 million.

We have been working and continue to work to prevent cuts and see the government reward LSU for its high levels of performance in recent years. We are delighted that a performance-based funding formula is being considered for the future distribution of state funds, and advocate stimulus money being distributed based on performance as well.

We will continue to provide open discussion with all of the LSU community and will provide updates on the funding process as we learn more. It is my goal to keep the LSU community as informed as I possibly can. Whatever the result of these budget cuts, I ask everyone in the LSU family to keep the faith and to pull together for the future of our great university. We are going to fight to maintain the integrity of our academic core and to continue to make LSU a great place to work and get an education.

[Schema Thing]

1. What a stupid, stupid man

the religion that is LSU worship in the state of Louisiana will not take this apostasy lightly.

[billyoc]

2. Geaux Tigers!

:rofl:

[blitzen]

3. if only we could channel the worship of LSU football into the worship of...

LSU academics.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

4. So we get to take their federal tax dollars, and they don't get stimulus?

[Turbineguy]

5. It's really a Tax Cut!

People who are less educated, earn less, therefore pay less taxes. That makes this a tax cut!

You just gotta know repub math, which may soon be cut too.

[ThoughtCriminal]

6. Same thing has been happening in Arizona

The republicans in state legislature have been really excited about the budget shortfall as an opportunity to stick it to our schools and universities, while continuing to hand out tax breaks for our richest citizens and corporations. Contempt for public education and higher learning has become a leading core value for the GOP.

Their party is dying and ir almost seems to be part of the Scorched-Earth strategy. Do damage that will still be felt after they're gone from power.

http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/daily/local/112016.php

In the midst of all the budget discussions at the regents meeting, NAU President John Haeger said his university "is losing faculty even as we speak," when trying to impress upon regents how important state funding is to universities.

That prompted UA President Robert N. Shelton to reveal that a recent request by three UA deans led him to call five UA faculty who "have gotten significant offers elsewhere" to try to persuade them to keep their teaching and research in Tucson.

Shelton would not reveal which professors had been approached by academic poachers or what he offered to get them to stay, but conceded that Arizona's negative investment in higher education leads good professors to look elsewhere.

"The best anchor we have on people now is they can't sell their homes," he said.

[TheCoxwain]

7. Thank God I did not take the UNO offer..

I was offered a tenure track position at University of New Orleans (it is funded by the state) ... It was my first time at New Orleans ( I am from New Jersey) ... I heard horror stories about tenured faculty being laid off under financial exigency post hurricane Katrina - That plus the specter of hurricanes ( this was 3 weeks after Gustav) and people having to run for their lives each time a hurricane threatened their shores led me to decline it .. I felt really guilty as UNO paid for my airfare and Hotel stay ... But I think it was for the best.

[madrchsod]

8. what no cuts in the football budget ?

fuck learning... it`s the lsu tigers who rule!

[RB TexLa]

9. Didn't see any state support in TAF. Can't cut what you don't pay for.

TO: Fans, Friends, and Supporters of LSU Athletics



FROM: Skip Bertman, Athletics Director



$8 million is a lot of money.



Thanks to you, LSU has $8 million more to spend on academics than it would if you weren't buying tickets to LSU athletic events, making donations to our athletics program, consuming hot dogs and soft drinks at our games, wearing LSU hats and t-shirts, watching the Tigers on television and listening on the radio.



As I have mentioned to you here many times before, the LSU Athletic Department is financially self-sufficient. It uses no state tax dollars and takes no student fees. Not a dollar from the state of Louisiana goes into LSU Athletics, and a recent action by the State of Louisiana Board of Regents has magnified the importance of that fact.

http://www.lsutaf.org/content.php?display=mission_of_taf

[madrchsod]

10. dam that`s impressive!

i`m used to high school politics when it comes to cutting budgets.

[Schema Thing]

11. A drive thru LA makes clear how this can be

There are LSU colors being sold and pimped in every nook and cranny and corner gas station in that state.