Budget and Planning

President's letter to faculty and staff

Oct. 29, 2009

To Iowa State Faculty and Staff:

This morning I am presenting to the Board of Regents our plan for dealing with the mid-year $24.5 million reduction in our state funding. This plan has been developed after much discussion with campus leaders and the University Budget Advisory Committee, and with valuable input from the campus community. I truly appreciate all of the communications and suggestions that many of you sent in. I and other members of the administrative team read every submission, and that collective input was influential in our planning. A link to my PowerPoint presentation will be posted on Iowa State's homepage immediately after I complete my remarks to the Regents.

To handle the $24.5 million cut, we propose to distribute the reduction across the major campus budget units (colleges, vice presidents, etc.) and implement a series of university-wide actions that will assist all units in achieving their assigned reductions. These university-wide actions include:

• A $100 surcharge to students for Spring Semester, which will generate approximately $2.4 million that will be distributed to the academic colleges.
• A temporary reduction of 2% in the university's contribution to employees' TIAA/CREF retirement accounts for the remaining 8 months of the fiscal year; this will generate approximately $2.6 million in general fund savings.
• A university-wide temporary layoff/furlough plan, graduated by salary level, which will generate approximately $7.0 million in savings for the general fund. For full-time 12-month employees, this plan would require 4 days of temporary layoff/furlough for employees with annual salaries of $60,000 or less; 6 days for employees with salaries between $60,001 and $120,000; 8 days for employees with salaries above $120,000; 10 days for a set of senior university administrators; and 12 days for me. For employees working less than 12 months and/or less than full-time, the number of days will be adjusted accordingly.
• A second retirement incentive plan (RIO2) with modified eligibility and benefits similar to this year's earlier RIO.

Subject to all appropriate approvals, details of all of these programs and how they impact our employee groups will be posted on the university's homepage as soon as they are available.

I deeply regret that we have to propose these actions, since I know they adversely impact our students and all of you, but the reality is that these cuts are serious and we only have eight months to address them. I thank you again for your hard work and understanding in these very challenging times.

Gregory L. Geoffroy
President

Geoffroy

"I deeply regret that we have to propose these actions, since I know they adversely impact our students and all of you, but the reality is that these cuts are serious and we only have eight months to address them."

President Gregory Geoffroy