Issue date: Nov. 6, 2003

McPherson provides budget update

By Kristin K. Anderson

Although state funding levels for higher education remain uncertain, MSU President Peter McPherson, in remarks to the Academic Council Oct. 28, urged the MSU community to continue fulfilling its responsibilities to students and other higher-education stakeholders.

“We take our responsibilities to all our stakeholders, as well as our research and problem-solving obligations, very seriously,” he said. “I think that the challenge for us has been that we’ve always said we have a dual expectation of ourselves -- cutting costs and maintaining and increasing quality.”

He said that since his return to the university from Iraq he has spent time listening to and hearing from various constituencies and examining information about current and future mid-year budget challenges.

“Universities were the largest single cut of any item in the state budget last time. It is very hard for state lawmakers to think about how to get these monies without really altering the nature of state government activity and service,” McPherson said.

“Lawmakers are presented with one of the more difficult public policy and political sets of judgments that have been in this state for many, many years.”

McPherson said he and other university officials engaged in the budget process have appreciated the efforts and actions of university departments and units to prioritize their future fiscal needs.

“We’re going through an internal process of getting ideas as to what reductions with priorities you would propose. This process is extremely painful but it is a sound way to do it,” he said. “It’s a bottom’s-up discussion. Inevitably, nobody is totally satisfied, but it works.”

There is a major public policy issue in Michigan, for MSU and around the country, McPherson said.

“That public policy issue is higher education. But, is it a public good to be paid for in significant part by the public, or is it a private good to be paid for by the individuals who utilize it?” he asked. “I know that we feel with a real intensity that public education has been a vital socio-economic opportunity for all groups of people in our state, and we simply can’t back away from that without serious long-term consequences.”

He said it’s not just an issue of whether funds to universities should be cut more this year, but rather a question of the implications to the state, country and society at large if people back away from public education.

“We’re going to continue to be a public university even if they back away some, or a lot. The money lawmakers provide is still significant, and we’re all committed to a public purpose,” McPherson said, “but I think it would change things significantly if this pattern continues.”

He urged students, parents, faculty, staff and alumni to become personally involved in letter writing and other efforts to explain the case for higher education and to contact legislators and focus on the individual concerns about how they would be impacted by higher- education funding cuts.

Also, he said Michigan universities as a group are making more of a concerted effort to promote collaboration and cooperation to ensure the quality of higher education in Michigan.

“If you didn’t worry about quality you could do a lot of things that might balance budgets, but what would you have? You have to watch the quality at the same time we cut these budgets,” he said. “I think that we need to not just see this as an incremental set of reductions. I don’t really believe this is the last year we’re going to be struggling with budgets.”