Where is the $12 million coming from?

Yesterday, the Arizona Daily Star reported that the University of Arizona is earmarking $12 million to recruit “rising star” professors in the areas of environmental studies and biosciences. Reporter Becky Pallack was first told that the source of funds for that $12 was unknown. Her story was updated today with information from UA spokesperson Johnny Cruz, who said the money will come from “a variety of sources, including savings generated through other cuts, money made available due to federal stimulus dollars and existing money dedicated to research,” according to Pallack’s story.

Not to be nit-picky, but that isn’t a very specific answer. What EXACTLY are the sources? What “other cuts” specifically? And how exactly is UA going to use the federal stimulus dollars when UA administrators have said repeatedly that the stimulus dollars are only for two years and thus can’t really be used as permanent funds?

I’m someone who likes specifics. I think it is because I’m not the sharpest pencil in the box – I need things explained to me in minute detail so I can connect the larger dots. What I need, basically (and I think it is something UA students and their parents would appreciate, if not UA faculty and staff) is a flow chart that reads something like this:

• $5 million from laying off 300 people in Departments X, Y, Z
• $3 million from outside grants from X, Y, Z
• $1 million from administrative savings by combining the secretaries and business managers from the colleges that were absorbed into the new Colleges of Arts, Letters and Sciences
• $1 million from the tuition hike
• $2 million from Federal Stimulus monies that we will eventually absorb with higher tuition

After reading Pallack’s story yesterday, I e-mailed UA President Robert Shelton asking where, specifically, the $12 million will come from, in light of the huge budget cut UA sustained last year and the massive mid-year tuition hike that was justified by UA administrators saying the university didn’t have enough money to operate. (more…)