YOUNGSTOWN Purse strings tighten at YSU

YSU and Ohio's other public universities keep a sharp eye on budget moves in Columbus.
By RON COLE
VINDICATOR EDUCATION WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Dr. David Sweet has one word to describe Youngstown State University's budget -- tight.
And that may be an understatement.
"Any conversations of any kind of cataclysmic actions is premature, but there's no question we're going to have one of the tightest budgets I've ever seen," the YSU president said.
The bad news actually started about two weeks ago, when Gov. Bob Taft implemented a 1 percent cut in the current state budget. With only three months left in the fiscal year, the cut translated into a $500,000 reduction for YSU.
Fortunately, YSU had about $500,000 extra cash in its budget heading into the end of the fiscal year because of higher-than-projected enrollments, Sweet said.
For marketing: Initially, that money had been targeted for marketing and other efforts to reach Sweet's goal to increase enrollment 5 percent by this fall.
That money now will go to make up the state reduction, and Sweet said YSU will look for grants and other streams of revenue to fund the enrollment push.
That leads to YSU's next hurdle: the 2001-02 budget, much of which hinges on the state budget now being debated in Columbus. About half of YSU's $100 million annual general fund budget comes from state subsidies.
Under Taft's proposed budget for 2001-02, YSU's basic state subsidies would go up about 2 percent or $1 million.
But, the amount of money YSU would get in a special budget line item called Access Challenge would increase dramatically, from $233,000 to $1.11 million.
Access funds are set aside to help make college more affordable. In March, in anticipation of the big increase in Access, YSU trustees passed a tuition plan that called for slightly decreasing fees for freshmen and associate degree students in the fall.
Things changed: Five weeks later, much has changed.
As state lawmakers scramble for ways to meet the Ohio Supreme Court's order to sufficiently fund public primary and secondary schools, higher education is expected to be targeted for cuts.
"Things have gotten progressively worse in Columbus," Sweet said.
He said it's clear the university will not get the level of state funding, including Access money, that it expected in March.
That means the tuition plan approved five weeks ago may have to be revised.
"Before we do a full assessment on that, we're going to wait and see," Sweet said.
"I'm not going to cross that bridge until I have some certainty on what the state allocations will be."
Sweet said YSU is locked into employee contracts that call for $3 million in salary increases next year.