State Budget

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In Radio Interview with Marketplace Yudof Eschews Privatization; Says Most State Politicians Don’t Understand UC

Byuclafaculty

In a radio interview today, UC President Mark Yudof discussed UC in the context of the state budget crisis. Issues that came up include privatization, faculty pay, and relations with the state in the context of the budget crisis. The portion aired was an excerpt. A full transcript – not just the excerpt – and audio of the full interview is below: Yudof Full Interview on Marketplace Jeremy Hobson: Mark Yudof is the President of California’s system and he joins us now. Mark Yudof, welcome to Marketplace. Mark Yudof: Well thank you. Thank you for inviting me. Hobson: The University…

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Chair of UCLA Faculty Assn. Comments on LA Times Article Concerning Legislative Challenges to UC Autonomy

Byuclafaculty

Below is a note from Chair Dwight Read followed by excerpts from the LA Times article to which he is responding. A link to the full article is also provided. A Note from the Chair of the UCLA Faculty Association Professor Dwight Read Today, Dec. 16, the LA Times ran an article, “State Wants Say in UC, CSU Budgets,” about a constitutional amendment that would strip the University of California of its autonomy. To provide historical context, the excerpt below explains how UC gained its autonomy, why the citizens of California voted for it in 1879, and why it is…

Internet Rumor: Zero for Higher Ed?

Byuclafaculty

Here is a re-posting from the liberal calitics blog which suggests that Governor-elect Brown will present a shock budget that would provide zero for higher ed. No other reports on the meeting Brown held at UCLA reported a literal zero for higher ed. It was not mentioned in the segment I previously posted from Which Way LA? on the Brown meeting. That there will be a shock budget seems a sure thing. Cuts for higher ed could certainly be part of it. I would be surprised by a total zero. But here is the entry:============ Jerry Brown as Jacob Marley…

Brown Summit at UCLA: Where Is the Video?

Byuclafaculty

The CalChannel was supposed to carry the Jerry Brown budget summit at UCLA earlier today live. Usually, that means there would be an archived video. But there was no sign of it – live or otherwise – on the CalChannel’s schedule for today and I was not available to see if anything aired live. (It was also supposed to be live on jerrybrown.org and a UCLA feed.) The meeting was focused on education but apparently mainly K-12. UCLA did provide the following media release: Governor-elect Brown at UCLA budget summit: There will be cuts By Alison Hewitt December 14, 2010…

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Update on the Bad Deal for the State Involving a Regent

Byuclafaculty

In a previous post, I noted that the state – as part of its efforts to raise cash – wants to sell various state office buildings and then lease them back. A Regent, Hadi Makarechian – as part of a consortium of various investment groups – is one of the buyers. The prior post is at Bad Deal for State Involves a UC Regent [Note: If you have trouble using the link above directly, simply go back to the December 3, 2010 entries for this blog.] Since the prior post went into the reasons why the deal – which is…

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Jerry Brown’s Second Budget Forum to be at UCLA This ComingTuesday

Byuclafaculty

Jerry Brown budget forum in Los Angeles set for Tuesday Capitol Alert, 12/9/10, David Siders Gov.-elect Jerry Brown released details this afternoon of his budget forum in Los Angeles next Tuesday. The meeting with education leaders follows a summit with lawmakers and local officials in Sacramento yesterday. Brown’s office described the event in an advisory as a meeting to “discuss the state’s fiscal challenges in K-12 and higher education.” It will be at UCLA. Like yesterday’s forum in Sacramento, the event is invitation-only. Brown’s transition office plans to stream the meeting online. “It’s really a continuation of the discussion that…

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The Incredible Shrinking University

Byuclafaculty

Andy Sabl pointed me to a lengthy article on the fate of UC entitled “Mission Shrinking.” An excerpt with a link to the full article is below. You can get the tone from the brief excerpt. Mission Shrinking, Diana Jean Schemo, Dec. 7, 2010 In the galaxy of public higher education, the University of California system once shined as a kind of North Star. In the 1960s and 1970s, the Golden State’s premier institutions, the University of California at Los Angeles and at Berkeley, boasted some of the strongest research and teaching faculties in the world. A UC education was…

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UCLA Forecasts Snail-Pace Growth Which Sets Context for Brown’s State Budget Conference

Byuclafaculty

From the press release for yesterday’s UCLA Anderson Forecast: California’s forecast, authored by Senior Economist Jerry Nickelsburg and titled “Laying the Groundwork for California’s Economic Recovery,” continues themes that began in September – almost imperceptibly slow growth until the end of next year. “with only the first indication of changes in consumer and business expectations revealing themselves in the contemporaneous data, and in the absence of an external driver to induce faster growth, this is the most likely scenario for this phase of the recovery,” Nickelsburg writes. Stated bluntly, California must re-employ 1.3 million workers just to get back to…

Special Budget Session Called by Governor Has No Cuts for UC

Byuclafaculty

In a sense, this is a non-story. Governor Schwarzenegger – as a lame duck with a month in office to go – has called a special session of the legislature to deal with the state budget. No one expects the legislature to do anything until Governor-Elect Brown takes office. Nonetheless, the current governor has proposed various budget solutions for the current year and next year which he totals at about $10 billion. There are some miscellaneous things such as putting advertising on freeway traffic signs. Much of what gets cut in the proposals is in the social service area, broadly…

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Bad Deal for State Involves a UC Regent

Byuclafaculty

The California’s Capitol blog reported yesterday on the involvement of a UC regent in a bad deal for the state. By way of background, the state has a major budget problem. No secret about that. It also has a major cash problem linked to its budgetary distress. One way that the state deals with these allied problems is to borrow. It can engage in short-term borrowing through revenue anticipation notes (borrowing within a fiscal year) and revenue anticipation warrants (which allow cross-year borrowing). However, under normal circumstances, longer-term borrowing is constrained by the state constitution. In essence, such borrowing requires…