Students dominate town hall

Despite being outnumbered by faculty and staff, student leaders dominated the budget cut town hall meeting yesterday, demanding administrators put the university’s budget online and be more transparent in the way they trim it.

But administrators said no, contending it would be too costly and time-consuming to put the 900-page document online, adding they didn’t want sensitive information such as employee salaries published. The budget is available in its  paper form in the Maryland Room of Hornbake Library.

“I’m not going to take the time to post it online to the world,” Vice President for Administrative Affairs Ann Wylie said in an interview after the meeting. “I don’t feel that it’s my responsibility to put it online, to put our people’s salaries all over the nation. Why do I have to? I have no obligation to publish it.”

The Diamondback publishes the salaries of each university employee in the annual Salary Guide, obtained via a Maryland Public Information Act request.

Faculty and staff members also questioned administrators about their benefits, why campus closure days are split between spring and winter breaks, and how they would keep track of their salary reductions from furloughs. The university chose to spread out pay cuts across the next 17 pay periods.

The town hall meeting was organized in late August to give the campus community an opportunity to ask questions about budget cuts and furloughs that weren’t answered on the university’s newly launched budget cut website, administrators said.

Wylie, President Dan Mote and Provost Nariman Farvardin occupied three chairs on the stage of the Hoff Theater to answer questions, while Senate Chair Elise Miller-Hooks moderated the discussion.

Nearly 300 people showed up, mostly faculty and staff members. That was what organizers expected, the president’s Chief of Staff Sally Koblinsky said.

But they probably didn’t expect Student Government Association Senior Vice President Elliott Morris to give them what he called a “multiple choice test.”

“Can students go to Hornbake Library and put the budget online?” he asked. “Answer A for yes, B for no. Answer why for extra credit.”

Administrators laughed, then argued that salary information in the budget isn’t public and said they would discuss the issue with Morris in private.

Other attendees had logistical questions. One staff member asked if the university would consider switching to a four-days-per-week schedule. Wylie said there wasn’t enough classroom space to get rid of Friday classes, and that people would expect offices to remain open. However, she said, some individual employees might be able to work four days a week instead of five.

Greg Johnson, the president of the campus chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union, asked administrators if employees would ever get back the money taken from their paychecks.

“Since we’re being cooperative when times are bad, we’d like to think that when times are good you’ll share that with us,” he said.

Mote said they would raise salaries when the university’s financial situation improves. When Johnson asked if they would consider switching to a three-year  bachelor’s degree program, Farvardin said they couldn’t rule out “radical solutions” to the university’s budget problems.

SGA President Steve Glickman asked the administrators what they were doing to move towards a better long-term funding model, instead of having to make cuts “year after year.”
Mote said he wants to use a model designed last fall by the Bohanan Commission — a state committee that developed a list of solutions earlier this year, aimed at making higher education more affordable — but said it would be difficult because the model carries a price tag of an additional $701 million over the next 10 years.

But what students were primarily concerned about was what they called a lack of openness in the budget reduction process.

“How can you ask everyone to pitch in when there’s not budget transparency and accountability?” asked Malcolm Harris, a Diamondback columnist and co-founder of  the university’s chapter of Students for a Democratic Society.

Wylie replied that the university has “full transparency” in how it distributes student fee money, and that the general outline of the university’s budget is available on their new website.

“That’s just not true,” Harris replied.

cwells at umdbk dot com