Regents seek smaller budget cut
Board also takes steps to reassure faculty on tenure
Madison — Creating a University of Wisconsin Public Authority isn’t the only way to gain autonomy from cumbersome state rules, a member of the UW System Board of Regents adamantly pointed out Thursday.
“All you have to do is amend state statutes,” said Regent David Walsh, an attorney who chairs the UW Hospital and Clinics Authority Board — another public authority created by the Legislature 20 years ago to give it flexibility to do business in a fastchanging marketplace.
Walsh said there are too many unknowns and unanswered questions about the public authority that Gov. Scott Walker proposed for the UW System as part of his state budget request. The new legal authority for the UW System would have to be created and in place by July 1, 2016, under the governor’s proposal, if approved by the Legislature.
“Until all these questions are answered we shouldn’t support a public authority,” Walsh told fellow regents during a meeting on the UWMadison campus. “You can’t make sausage this way. The hospital authority took two years to draft. The merger of the (UW) System took three years. It may be a good idea, but I don’t think we have all the information.”
Regents have long sought flexibilities for campuses in areas such as managing capital building projects, setting pay plans for faculty and staff, and procuring supplies independent of state involvement. Support for flexibilities still exists among regents; it’s just a question about what form those flexibilities take.
The governor proposed $300 million in state budget cuts for the UW System over the next two years — a 13% cut in state funding — in exchange for autonomy. UW System President Ray Cross said Thursday that it isn’t an exchange, the two are separate. But Walker has suggested the UW System agree to the cut in exchange for autonomy.
Cross asked the regents to support changing the UW System from a state agency to a public authority before the regents launched a lengthy discussion about it.
“You say, ‘Look, we’re going to cooperate and do everything we can with the (budget) cuts,’ ” said Walsh, who was appointed by thenGov. Jim Doyle. “As to the statutory authority, ‘No, we don’t need that.’ ”
Walsh ticked off a list of issues he thought would be of concern with a new public authority, including a loss of state funding for municipal services on campuses and loss of sovereign immunity in legal matters, to name just a few.
The regents unanimously passed a resolution asking the Legislature to “substantially reduce” the governor’s proposed budget cut, and to grant flexibilities for the UW System to do business more efficiently and effectively “either through an agreed-upon public authority” or by amending state statute.
The resolution also asked for “a dedicated funding stream” for UW System operations, which a public authority would include.
Several regents pointed out that predictable, stable funding for the UW System could never be counted on because one legislature can’t set policy for future legislatures.
“This is fairy dust. This is not something I think we can rely on,” Walsh said. “At the end of the day, this is about Draconian cuts” and efforts to persuade lawmakers to reduce those cuts. “Damn it. It’s time we step forward and send a message
to the State of Wisconsin that this is wrong and it’s not who we are.”
A new public authority would still be accountable to the state, Cross said. But there are questions about how much the UW System would gain in the end, since the state would still have control over building projects that involve state funding, and the governor has proposed capping future tuition increases at inflation once the authority was in place.
Walker also has proposed extending the current two-year freeze on resident undergraduate tuition through 2015-’17.
Shared governance, tenure
The regents took a big step Thursday in reassuring faculty and staff on campuses.
The regents approved appointment of two task forces to develop policies protecting shared governance and tenure — tenets of academia that Cross referred to as “fundamental pillars of a world-class university system.”
The task forces, to be appointed within weeks, would be led by chancellors and include provosts, faculty, staff and students. The goal would be to have board policy in place by the time a new UW System Public Authority took effect, if approved by the Legislature.
The board also will ask the Legislature for authority to establish its own policy if shared governance and tenure were immediately removed from state statute, instead of once a public authority was in place.
Shared governance allows faculty, staff and students to have a voice in developing policies that affect them. It includes faculty senates and university committees and student government. Tenure establishes academic freedom protections for faculty.
The prospect of potentially losing shared governance and tenure created uneasiness on campuses when it was revealed that Walker’s proposed budget deleted them. Campus groups asked the regents to establish protection immediately because of uncertainty over what would happen with the budget now being developed by the Legislature.
UW-Milwaukee Chancellor Mark Mone said he believes the regents’ move to preserve shared governance and tenure “is going to go a great distance” in resolving fears on campuses. “That’s a lot of what the undercurrent is,” he said.