Pitt does not pass budget at Board of Trustees meeting

Pitt will wait at least two more weeks to pass its budget, including the rise in tuition rates,… Pitt will wait at least two more weeks to pass its budget, including the rise in tuition rates, until after the state has finalized how much funding the University will get.

Though Friday’s Board of Trustees meeting did not include a budget, Art Ramicone, vice chancellor and budget controller, said that the budget will most likely be passed on July 8 at the Board of Trustees’ Budget Committee meeting. He did not give an estimate of what the tuition increase could be.

Chancellor Mark Nordenberg took a majority of the Friday meeting to discuss the impending cut in relation to Pitt’s state funding and the state’s reliance on Pitt to educate its residents in his address to the board. The board did not pass a budget and has not at the annual June meeting in many years. They are waiting for the state legislature to pass its budget.

The state has a constitutionally-mandated June 30 deadline for its budget, but the state has blown past the deadline in the past 10 years — sometimes by months. The governor, state House and Senate have all proposed different levels of funding for Pitt, and all three include cuts from the $160 million Pitt received from the state this year.

The governor’s proposal would halve Pitt’s total funding, the state Senate’s bill would cut it by 15 percent and the House’s bill would cut it by 25 percent. No matter which branch gets its way, Pitt will suffer a cut in state appropriations and in-state students will pay the price in tuition.

Regardless of which proposal passes, Pitt will lose more than $20 million in federal stimulus funding that it received starting in 2009. Pitt received $184 million in total in 2010.

Ramicone said that Pitt had asked for a 5 percent increase in state funding at the beginning of the year. University officials said that Pitt would cap tuition increases at 4 percent if the state increased its funding.

Instead of getting increased funding, Ramicone said the University is “getting a pretty big shield,” but the board is going to try not to put the whole burden of price on the students.

“We realize there are working families and working students so we’re going to try to be reasonable about it,” Ramicone said.

In his address to the board, Nordenberg emphasized the importance of Pitt in both the state and the city, specifically its importance in creating jobs, doing research and preparing Pennsylvania students for the future.

Pitt became a state-related school in the 1960s, as part of an agreement with the legislature. The state would provide a portion of the university’s budget in exchange for lower tuition for in-state residents. The appropriation has been about 10 percent of Pitt’s budget over the past decade.

“Since the mid 1960s, the state has had a desperate need to provide reasonably priced educational opportunities,” Nordenberg said at the meeting.

Nordenberg emphasized that the university was aware of the daunting challenges faced with the current state administration from the budget deficit they inherited.

“The governor and other elected leaders face difficult budgetary challenges and Pitt must be willing to do its part,” he said.

After Nordenberg spoke, the Nominating Committee elected two new trustees to the board: Roberta Luxbacher and Thomas Richards.

The trustees also re-elected Stephen Tritch as chairman of the board and Suzanne Broadhurst and Robert Hernandez were both re-elected as vice chairpersons.

The board also re-elected various trustees, including: Emil Spadafore Jr., A. David Tilstone, G. Nicholas Beckwith III, Michael Bryson, Charles Bunch, Robert Lovett, Martha Hartle Munsch, John Pelusi Jr., William Strickland Jr. and Stephen Tritch.

Suzanne Broadhurst, Michael Bryson, Robert Hernandez and John Pelusi Jr. were also elected to serve as trustees of the University of Pittsburgh Trust.