Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger released his May revised 2008-09 budget proposal this afternoon. Today's budget proposal allocates $97.6 million more for the CSU than his earlier proposal, but still presents a significant funding gap for the CSU. California Faculty Association (CFA) President Lillian Taiz called it a step in the right direction toward adequately funding our state university system.
From the Higher Education portion of the budget proposal summary:
Due to the State’s significant budget shortfall, the Governor’s Budget proposed to suspend the provisions of the Higher Education Compact (Compact) to help achieve fiscal balance. The May Revision protects education funding and makes additional resources available to the University of California (UC), the California State University (CSU) and the California Community Colleges (CCC) to ensure affordability, preserve quality and maintain essential levels of access. […] While the greater budget gap prevents fulfillment of the Compact, additional General Fund resources are provided to UC and CSU to ensure that fees will not increase beyond the levels agreed to in the Compact, to preserve enrollments in high‐state‐need instructional programs, and to address cost pressures from required implementation of new Teaching Performance Assessment standards pursuant to Chapter 517, Statutes of 2006. Thus, mandatory undergraduate fees will rise by no more than 7.4 percent for UC students and 10 percent for CSU students.
[…]
Total funding in 2008‐09 for CSU increases from year to year by $132.8 million (3 percent), with total General Fund essentially flat compared to 2007‐08.
[…]
The May Revision proposes a General Fund increase of $97.6 million to maintain funding for CSU level from year to year and to limit fee increases to the levels agreed to in the Compact. This funding is also intended to preserve enrollment levels in high‐state‐need instructional programs and provide resources for implementation of the Teaching Performance Assessment standards for teacher preparation programs required to be implemented in 2008‐09 pursuant to Chapter 517, Statutes of 2006 that would otherwise have to be absorbed. Thus, the unallocated portion of the reduction to the workload budget level for CSU is reduced to $172.1 million for a revised total reduction of $215.3 million.
Budget Links
- CFA on the revised budget (CFA) [PDF]
- May Revise Restores $97.6 Million to CSU Budget (CSU press release)
- California State Budget 2008-09 (Department of Finance)
- Revised budget detail: Higher Education (Department of Finance)
- Revised budget detail: California State University (Department of Finance)
- Governor's Budget May Revision Summary: Higher Education (Department of Finance) [PDF]
- Governor Schwarzenegger Proposes Responsible Budget with Creative Solutions in Face of Worse Deficit (Governor's Office press release)
News Stories and Commentary
- Governor proposes deeper health and welfare cuts (Sacramento Bee)
- Schwarzenegger defends using lottery funds to pay off budget deficit (San Francisco Chronicle)
- Governor's budget plan would divert gas taxes to help close gap (Los Angeles Times)
- Dan Walters: California confronts a budget deficit with more gimmicks (Sacramento Bee)
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