{"id":174943,"date":"2016-08-08T19:04:00","date_gmt":"2016-08-09T01:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=174943"},"modified":"2016-08-08T19:04:00","modified_gmt":"2016-08-09T01:04:00","slug":"budget-problems-at-nmsu-then-and-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2016\/08\/budget-problems-at-nmsu-then-and-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Budget problems at NMSU, then and now"},"content":{"rendered":"

COMMENTARY:<\/strong>\u00a0Many people were surprised at the recent controversy about New Mexico State University<\/a> needing to save $12 million because of a budget shortfall. There are many hard feelings from\u00a0people being cut and the pushback against\u00a0any cuts is enormous.<\/p>\n

\"Michael

Courtesy photo<\/p>

Michael Swickard<\/p><\/div>\n

What the administration of NMSU wanted was to make no cuts and force the students to cover the budget shortfall by another tuition increase.<\/p>\n

They want that even though enrollment is dropping because of the tuition increases over 20\u00a0years that raised\u00a0tuition and fees from $600 a semester to over $4,000 a semester.<\/p>\n

The NMSU Regents would not go for another increase<\/a>, so the budget axe has fallen on several programs, with the resultant howls of outrage.<\/p>\n

Budget problems have been a continuing problem at NMSU, starting with the institution\u2019s first classes in January 1890 clear up to today. Often something was done to shrink the budget.<\/p>\n

In June 1997 here is part of what I wrote in a\u00a0column:<\/p>\n

There is a battle going on at New Mexico State University – not a noisy battle with clanking swords, it is a battle of wills. As with most battles there\u2019s winners and losers. Some employees will gain, some will lose. It was started by a June 18, 1997 report from the NMSU Strategic Planning Academic Programs subcommittee which rated academic programs and recommended some academic programs be eliminated.<\/p>\n

What effect will this have on the citizens of New Mexico? I don\u2019t know but this scuffling is good for NMSU and New Mexico. It forces the NMSU leaders to accept they cannot be all things to all people. A priority must be established for the NMSU core programs.<\/p>\n

Three perceptions: First, it\u2019s good someone started the process of aligning the academic programs to NMSU\u2019s mission; secondly, the committee members are going to be flamed vigorously by employees who stand to lose; and this is just a report, the NMSU Administration and Regents will make the decisions.<\/p>\n

The mission of NMSU is to benefit the citizens of New Mexico. The output of NMSU is graduates, research done and the service that NMSU\u2019s faculty, staff and students provide New Mexico\u2019s citizens.<\/p>\n

One of the recommendations was that the Philosophy Department be eliminated. Those professors did not take that recommendation philosophically. There was a call to eliminate the Engineering Technology Department. The people in these departments will be injured by these decisions, if they are made.<\/p>\n

Still, there comes a time when the injury to a few must be accepted. NMSU is not some employment agency that seeks to employ the most people possible regardless of need – even if that is what it seems.<\/p>\n

NMSU has a job to do in this time of declining budgets. They must insure NMSU is of benefit to the citizens of New Mexico above any personal interests of NMSU\u2019s employees.<\/p>\n

It is a battle of priorities – personal and professional. There will be winners and losers. Hopefully, the losers won\u2019t be the citizens of New Mexico.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Amazingly the issues today are much the same as in 1997, while the NMSU Philosophy Department remains with seven professors. Nineteen years after they were identified as not a priority they remain — nor were they cut this time.<\/p>\n

The University of New Mexico has 13\u00a0faculty members in its\u00a0Philosophy Department. In good financial times both NMSU and UNM can duplicate each other\u2019s programs to no harm. But when money is tight, as was noted in 1997, this is one place to cut.<\/p>\n

The notion is that once a program is started using public money, once the first person is hired by the government in some form or another, there can be no shrinkage of the size of government. In fact, there is a notion that all government must cost more every year, even with money becoming tight.<\/p>\n

Having worked at both UNM and NMSU at different times over the last 40\u00a0years, I have experienced the budget-crunch syndrome at both institutions. In every case I have said, \u201cGuess now we will see what our core priorities are at this institution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Often the priorities are the employees rather than the citizens of New Mexico. We should change that.<\/p>\n

Michael Swickard is a former radio talk show host and has been a columnist for 30\u00a0years in a number of New Mexico newspapers. Swickard\u2019s new novel,\u00a0Hideaway Hills, is now available at\u00a0Amazon.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Often the priorities are the employees rather than the citizens of New Mexico. We should change that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":119613,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192,16,4],"tags":[196,125,133,107],"class_list":["post-174943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","category-guest-columns","category-swickard-columns","tag-budget","tag-education","tag-nmsu","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=174943"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174943\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}