The anticipated reduction in state funding for UB in the next fiscal year and the importance of the mandatory comprehensive fee were the main topics of discussion on Monday's "Talk of the University," a WBFO radio show featuring President William R. Greiner and Vice President for Student Affairs Dennis Black.
Although Gov. George E. Pataki will not reveal his proposed SUNY budget until next month, Greiner said he is predicting at least a 5 percent decrease in funding.
Because of the nation's current recession, Greiner said UB should be prepared to receive less funding for quite some time.
"We at the university are put to test to generate revenues and cost control," Greiner said. "There are restrictions on us as to what we can do in order to respond to reduction."
He said the university staff is preparing for "another challenging year" and "must manage resources more carefully than we have."
Despite budget cuts, Black said UB's goal is to "preserve key academic integrity" and fulfill students' expectations.
In the face of decreased support from the state, Black and Greiner stressed the importance of the comprehensive fee attached to every student's tuition bill, which includes the student life, athletics and technology fees.
Black said he finds it both surprising and impressive that students are willing to pay more for a quality academic experience. To provide students with programs and activities they want, Black said the administration pays close attention to the input they get from various student groups.
"We deal with fees directly with students. We have student input devices that tell us what they want to have and what is important, and what are they are willing to pay for it is determined," Black said. "This way, we sometimes have support from the majority of the students when decisions are made involving costs."
Even though students must pay fees, Black called UB a "higher education bargain," since the total amount of tuition with the comprehensive fee is $4,700 per year.
Greiner said the comprehensive fee has made UB's high technology rankings possible.
"UB is top 10 in wired campuses, high-speed computing capacity marks us no worse than fifth in the nation and 22 in the world," Greiner said. "All of this took careful building and planning over years."
Greiner and Black also discussed future developments on the North Campus, specifically the proposed recreation center. If constructed, the center could be part of the upcoming Lee Road project, a collection of commercial shopping and dining venues, apartments, and parking lots built between the Academic Spine and the Ellicott Complex.
According to Black, a feasibility study was conducted to determine whether students would be in favor of building a high-quality recreation facility. The students, he said, responded that they "want the facility to be done the right way."
In addition, Black said he would like to see "something like an 'urban street square'" built as part of the Lee Road project, because "we need to make the center of campus work with the rest of campus."
