Chancellor Block Among Signatories to Anti-Sequestration Letter

California has its budget trigger cuts about which we have written on this blog.  At the federal level, you will be hearing more as time goes by about “sequestration,” a kind of trigger cut mechanism Congress created to give it an incentive to enact a “grand bargain” on federal spending and the federal deficit.  Basically, if no such bargain is reached, massive defense and non-defense cuts go into effect on January 2.  The idea was that the thought of such cuts would be so frightful that Congress would concoct a grand bargain instead.  It hasn’t worked so far.  (But these sorts of things tend to work – if they work – close to the deadline.)

In any event, UCLA Chancellor Block is among various higher ed leaders who have sent a letter to the President and Congress warning of the impact on universities, should sequestration occur.  You can find the letter at http://www.aplu.org/document.doc?id=3970  (His name is on page 2.)

A story on the letter’s background is at
http://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2012/07/12/college-presidents-warn-sequestration

Undoubtedly, there will be more and more attention to this matter as we get closer to January 2.