Low enrollment leads to budget cuts

Ohio University administrators are proposing that the board of trustees approve an approximately $720 million operating budget for the 2017-18 academic year that includes unspecified cuts.

The trustees are scheduled to meet Thursday and Friday at the university’s Zanesville campus.

Factors including the anticipated imposition of a tuition freeze in the new two-year state budget and a decline in the number of freshmen enrolled for the fall semester on the Athens campus have contributed to the budget challenges, according to budget documents prepared for the trustees.

Among total expected undergraduate enrollment of 24,020 in Athens for fall

semester, 4,109 are freshmen, 200 fewer than fall 2016. The university’s regional campuses expect 8,350 undergraduates in the fall, also a slight decline from the enrollment in fall 2016.

The budget documents the university has posted online do not spell out how the cuts will affect colleges and departments, or whether faculty and support staff jobs would be eliminated.

University officials will not provide additional information about the impact of the proposed cuts until the trustees meet, spokesman Jim Sabin said.

Each department was asked to develop plans to absorb a 5 percent cut. This amounted to $4.9 million in cuts. Plans for fiscal years 2019 and 2020 call for cutting another $2 million each year, according to budget documents.

The budget documents show no raises for most faculty and support staff in the 2017-18 academic year, although medical college faculty will be eligible for raises in a continuing effort to make up for a previous pay lag.

Administrators plan to draw $3.8 million from the university’s $31 million Strategic Opportunity Reserve to help offset the loss from declining enrollment and tuition “constraints,” according to budget documents. The reserve, funded by unbudgeted money, investment returns and other sources, serves as a rainyday fund to be used when necessary.

The board of trustees has approved in-state tuition of $6,066 per semester (for 12 to 20 credit hours) for the 2017-18 academic year, according to budget documents, compared with $5,872 per semester (for 12 to 20 credit hours) in the 2016-17 academic year. The tuition the board approved is subject to change, however, the documents note, if the tuition freeze remains in the new state budget.