Nellis to JFAC: Raises needed to avoid losing top UI faculty, researchers, staff…

BOISE, Idaho (AP) — University of Idaho President Duane Nellis bemoaned the loss of key faculty members due to the budget crunch Wednesday, saying most employees on the Moscow campus have not had a salary increase in four years and boosting compensation is his highest priority.

“I worry about morale on campus. I worry about losing some of our best people. We’ve already lost some really outstanding people,” Nellis told The Associated Press after he reported to the Idaho Legislature’s budget writing committee. “I just can’t emphasize enough how we need some indication of support there.”

Nellis told the panel he was encouraged by the governor’s budget recommendation for the next fiscal year, which includes a $16.9 million boost in state support for Idaho’s public universities. The governor’s budget also includes a 3 percent pay bonus for state workers, including university professors and faculty, but that’s only if state tax revenues stay on track.

A legislative committee, however, opted Tuesday for a tax revenue forecast that’s about $33 million less than the one favored by Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter, a Republican.

Nellis, when reporting to the Idaho Legislature’s budget writing committee, was asked to list his priorities given the lower revenue target.

“I think the lowest priority from my perspective is the dollars the governor has recommended for the rainy day fund,” Nellis said. “I just don’t know if this is the year to do that.”

Otter has proposed replenishing a reserve account for public schools and kicking in the first state payment to a similar account for higher education. Under the governor’s budget, the state would shift $4.9 million into a reserve account for Idaho’s universities and colleges.

The lower revenue target will make it difficult for lawmakers to carry out the governor’s plan to replenish Idaho’s rainy day accounts, said Sen. Dean Cameron, R-Rupert, who co-chairs the budget writing committee.

State reserves have been drained to nearly nothing from $384 million four years ago.

“We’ll have to put some toward the reserve funds because of a statutory requirement,” Cameron said. “But we may end up looking at triggers, should our revenue exceed expectations, for additional money into reserve funds.”

Nellis listed wheat breeder Robert Zemetra, a professor of plant breeding and genetics, among the faculty members who have left the university amid the budget shortfalls, which have forced employees in recent years to take on more responsibilities while their wages remain, for the most part, unchanged. Zemetra went to Oregon State University, where he will earn a significantly higher salary, Nellis said.

“He’s just one example of the types of faculty that we’ve lost due to our budget situation,” Nellis said.

If state revenues turn out to be less than what the governor projected and lawmakers do away with Otter’s proposed $41 million in pay bonuses for state workers, Nellis said it would be very difficult for the university to find the money elsewhere to provide faculty a wage increase.

“Maybe there’s a way with a slightly greater tuition increase to provide some small, and I emphasize small, level of (change in employee compensation),” Nellis said. “But I would much rather that the state step up than putting that on the backs of the students.”

Lawmakers have already started to question Idaho’s public universities on whether they will continue to seek tuition increases, as they have during the past several years to help balance their budgets, given the possibility of increased state funding for higher education in 2013.

With increases approved by the state Board of Education last April, full-time undergraduate students are paying 5 percent to 8.4 percent more in tuition and fees this year.