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The University of Maine System may have to cut as many as 100 positions during the next two academic years as part of an effort to close a $15 million budget gap, according to system Chancellor Richard Pattenaude.
State lawmakers have asked the university system to close the budget gap, and Pattenaude told the legislative Education Committee Tuesday the $15 million cuts would be the equivalent of 100 full-time positions.
“It’s a way to say if we had to take it all in people, that’s what it might amount to,” Pattenaude said Wednesday following a public forum on restructuring.
Pattenaude said they “certainly don’t want to” cut 100 positions. He said it was a different way of measuring $15 million. When asked what was the likelihood of positions being cut at university campuses, Pattenaude said, “It depends upon many things … how effectively we can find some economies of scale, how much we can reduce administrative costs, energy costs, whether enrollments increase. Our last step is always to eliminate jobs.”
Pattenaude said positions that are cut may include faculty positions.
“There’s a lot of variables right now and there’s a lot of uncertainty. Some will have to be faculty, just because faculty are such a large part of our workforce,” Pattenaude said.
Pattenaude said cutting the equivalent of 100 faculty positions would affect 300 to 400 classes. He said any cuts in positions would be campus decisions, not choices made at the system level.
University of Maine President Robert Kennedy said after Wednesday’s meeting that cutting positions at UMaine would depend on a number of factors.
“We assume that’s within the realm of possibility,” Kennedy said. “The chancellor said cuts on the campus would be a campus prerogative, but that will depend upon the budget we’ve been given by the system — so it’s not entirely independent of the system.”
Kennedy said it’s possible UMaine would consider cutting faculty positions because the magnitude of the desired budget cuts is so large. He said the university is uncertain what those positions could be. The president said the Academic Program Prioritization Workgroup — a collection of professors and administrators charged with looking at the university’s programs — will provide advice for potentially cutting any positions.
“They’re looking at our priorities across the campus, so we will take cues from them … and that would determine, perhaps, what positions could be considered for cuts,” Kennedy said.
Kennedy said the university system would distribute cuts among the campuses using the same formula used to divide up the budget — meaning UMaine would be forced to share a large burden of the cuts because its budget is the biggest.
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