Welcome back to the spring semester! Before I begin my remarks today, I first want to honor our colleague and dear friend President Harold Haak, who passed away the day after Christmas. I was honored to follow Harold as president of Fresno State. Every day of my tenure here I have seen the results of his good works and his generosity of spirit. Harold was a brilliant man, a true scholar. He was committed to improving the university experience at Fresno State, at Fresno Pacific University and the University of Colorado -institutions where he served as President or Chancellor for twenty years. Dr. Haak has had an enormous impact on higher education in Central California.

Harold was certainly the “rainbow in the storms of life.” His leadership at Fresno State was both compassionate and strong. His vision for the future inspired both the faculty and students of this campus. Thousands of lives were touched by this great man. Join me now as we observe a moment of silence to honor Dr. Harold H. Haak, husband and father, professor, scholar and president of California State University, Fresno.

Thank you…

You all have been reading and watching the news about Governor Schwarzenegger’s proposed state budget. I know you also are wondering about the impact here at Fresno State. You’re probably feeling some nervousness about the future. Let me say…these are anxious times for university presidents, too. We have begun to feel the impact at Fresno State and across the California State University. Over the next several months we will be making painful decisions as we cope with a very serious fiscal crisis in the state of California. Today, I’m going to describe for you exactly how we will be dealing with the budget and the principles we will be following as we make those decisions.

This university has been taking steps over the past several years that will enable us to

persevere… and to respond in these tough budgetary times. Fortunately, with the

As Chancellor Reed said, admitting fewer students means fewer educated citizens entering the workforce to stimulate the economy and provide the jobs that the governor stressed in his State of the State address. Not investing in higher education will have a devastating impact on the state’s economic future. This impact is even more dramatic in Central California where we must increase the educational level of our workforce. The choice California seems to be facing is more taxpayers or more people will be dependent upon government support for survival.

Fresno State has been working, and will continue to work, with the California State University Office of the Chancellor to advocate for the students of Central California with the Governor, the Legislature and the CSU Board of Trustees. We will make the case that Fresno State plays a unique role in Central California…the section of the state that is struggling most in the current economy. The needs here…in unemployment, poverty, poor health care, and infrastructure…are intense. Fresno State is the economic and cultural engine for the Central California—”The New California.” We need the state’s continuing investment and involvement in our campus and this region. I know the faculty, students, and friends of this great university will help us make that case.

So what are the policy directions proposed by the new administration?

• Fees to California colleges and universities will go up. The Governor is proposing a new approach to fees which results in a more predictable fee policy and sharply differentiates fees at the undergraduate and graduate level. Specifically, he proposes that undergraduate fees increase by ten percent for 2004-05 and graduate in-state fees increase by forty percent. Non-resident fees would increase by an additional twenty per cent at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Future fee increases would be linked to per capita income increases. This action would bring California’s student fees more in line with the higher fees in place in other states. We will need to move swiftly to help needy students as these fee increases are

So how do we cope with the immediate budget cuts? For the past two and a half years, our university has taken active steps to reduce the impact of budget cuts. The University Budget Committee has worked to carefully consider where cuts would be made with the least impact on the educational services of the university.

As a result of those careful deliberations, we took several difficult steps to cope with the shortfall that resulted from a 13 percent cut in funding this year. This year we have managed a $21.1 million cut to this university’s state funding, or about 12 and a half percent of our prior year base budget. Fees were increased by 30 percent by the CSU system to mitigate part of the impact of those the impact of those reductions. That fee increase offset our campus reduction by approximately $9.2 million. We received $7.5 million in new enrollment growth funding. That left us with a $4.4 million net budget shortfall. In addition to these budget reductions, we have absorbed unfunded increases of $3 million for some salary increases, higher health care premiums and risk pool insurance.

We closed applications at an earlier time for the fall 2003 semester and pushed ahead the application deadlines for this spring. We chose not to accept applications from first-time freshmen or lower-division transfer students for the spring semester. We moved to larger and fewer classes. We reduced staff and faculty positions and reduced the number of temporary employees. There have been no salary increases for employees.

I eliminated 10 management positions, including positions in my own office, which resulted in re-assignment, a reduction in time base, or termination for those employees. These actions saved $1 million dollars.

These cuts were not easy, but now we will have to do even more. Specifically, for next year we will have to reduce our base budget by $12 million and serve 1,500 fewer students. This is the net figure after we calculate the proposed fee increases.

5. Where steps have been taken to provide support for grant and contract growth, seek to minimize the level of reduction or propose an alternative approach to maintaining progress which has been made.

6. Maintain essential services at an adequate level and reduce or eliminate non-essential services.

7. Propose reductions consistent with the priorities which are identified in the University’s Plan for Excellence.

8. Give consideration to expenditures which can be delayed or deferred for a period of time.

9. Do not compromise the safety and health of the campus community and its members and seek to address the welfare of our students and employees during a very difficult time.

In the past there has been the question of reductions of our workforce or lay-offs when we face very difficult fiscal times. Last year we were able to limit reductions in the workforce to the elimination of ten management positions and to limiting the filling of staff positions which became vacant. In some cases, the staff position was filled as a temporary appointment lasting only until funding ended. We have also held a number of positions open which has required many of you to accept additional responsibility. We will continue these practices to restrict the filling of staff positions.

As the schools, colleges, and divisions begin to restructure their programs in an effort to achieve efficiencies per the principles I mentioned earlier, we will reassign employees in areas where positions may be eliminated to vacancies in areas of critical need.

We will continue our efforts to avoid laying off employees. However, given the severity of the reductions we face, I cannot promise you at this time that layoffs will not be necessary. Should we find it necessary to take this step, we will follow the appropriate contractual requirements that provide for notification of bargaining units and employees. I understand the unease that this situation brings to many members of our workforce and I am sensitive to your need for information. Please be assured that we are doing as much

Please support this bond measure — and encourage friends, family, and colleagues to vote for it, too. In fact, I have a request–Everyday that you wake up between now and March 2, REMIND YOURSELF HOW CENTRAL A GREAT LIBRARY CAN BE IN THE LIFE OF THE UNIVERSITY AND ASK YOURSELF WHAT CAN I DO TODAY TO HELP PASS PROPOSITION 55?

As you know, we completed our first phase in the WASC accreditation process as a team visited our campus in November. The team indicated that we were a “national model for institutions interested in becoming generators of social mobility, economic development, and smile* success.” Further, the team acknowledged the outstanding work of our faculty staff and administrators. I am very pleased that your work was reaffirmed.

I am also pleased that the California State University and CFA have reached a tentative agreement on a contract through June 30, 2005. You will be hearing more about this from Bob Merrill, CFA President.

Finally, Fresno State is about to begin the largest fund-raising campaign in its history. The campaign is a multi-year fund-raising effort to improve the overall excellence of the university as Fresno State approaches its centennial in 2011.

Work on the fund-raising campaign has been under way for almost two years. Faculty members have been identifying major academic goals for the campaign and university administrators have been conducting meetings with community leaders to begin to rally support for the effort.

Fresno State anticipated the trends in state funding and the need to expand private giving and other sources of support. Work on the comprehensive campaign began before the current crisis in California’s budget. As a result of that foresight, Fresno State is poised to achieve meteoric success, rather than mediocrity imposed by diminishing state resources.

providing a series of “white papers” tracing the development of the campaign goals and the key next steps in the campaign.

One of the nation’s top fund-raising strategists will be joining us next month to help coordinate the campaign. Mary Anna Dunn, Fresno State’s first campaign director, will work within Fresno State’s Division of University Advancement, headed by Vice President Peter Smits.

Dunn was the chief strategist and leader of the recent billion-dollar campaign for the University of Colorado, a four-campus system. The campaign was successfully completed in June 2003. She was also a key player in Colorado’s first comprehensive campaign, which raised more than $270 million dollars.

The comprehensive campaign will enable Fresno State to put greater substance behind its role as the region’s major university. The campaign will do that by generating private and corporate giving to support excellence in teaching and research and to fund initiatives that enable the university to better serve this region. We don’t have to depend only on the state for our success. We can chart our own course.

Our university community can create a new Fresno State for a New California. That’s the future I see as we head toward our centennial in 2011. Together we can make it happen.