Maine Gov. John Baldacci handed down a curtailment order of nearly $6 million to the University of Maine System on Friday.

The curtailment order for all state entities totals more than $63 million. The system’s cut of $5.97 million is the third largest, representing 3.38 percent of its state appropriation.

Public education took the largest curtailment order of $38.1 million, and the Department of Health and Human Services received the second-largest cut of $11.15 million, representing 1.35 percent of its state appropriation. Maine’s community college system received a cut of nearly $1.7 million.

The system was expecting a curtailment order of $7.5 million, according to Rebecca Wyke, vice chancellor for finance and administration. The smaller curtailment order is intended to reduce the impact on the system’s three smallest campuses and reduce the number of class sections eliminated, Wyke said.

“We were notified in mid-October that we would have a likely reduction of approximately $7.5 million. The governor’s announcement of his curtailment today actually reduces that to just under $6 million,” Wyke said.

The individual schools won’t know exact numbers for a few days, but UMaine spokesperson Joe Carr said the university would not cut any personnel because of the curtailment.

“We’ll do things like reduce capital projects and cut in other non-personnel areas,” Carr said.

UMaine will use stimulus money to help fill the gap left by the curtailment.

“As of right now, we don’t have detailed plans for how we’ll manage this. We don’t have the exact number in fact. So all we can really say is, in general, the plan is to use the stimulus money to a great extent,” Carr said.

Wyke said when the curtailment is originally proposed, each campus submits an impact report to the system office, which then combines the reports into one. The original impact statement said the curtailment could limit acquisition of library and instructional materials and delay necessary repairs to facilities. The report also said the University of Maine at Machias might have to cut its campus security, and the University of Maine at Presque Isle might have to cut student employment. UMM spokesperson Erik Smith said Friday the campus would most likely no longer have to reduce its security force.

“It was something that was included in the impact statement,” Smith said. “I believe it would have been in the form of further reduction. At this point, with the revised, or reduced, curtailment, we won’t know exactly how that will impact our campus budget until next week when the president’s cabinet has a chance to discuss the revised numbers.”

There were 13 liquor law violations that resulted in judicial referrals and no arrests on the Machias campus in 2007, according to UMM’s crime report. In the same time, there were 591 liquor law violations at UMaine, 92 of which resulted in arrests and 499 of which resulted in judicial referrals.

The system received $174.9 million in fiscal year 2001, according to Wyke. This year’s initial appropriation was $176.4 million, which has since been reduced to $170.5 million.

“It has been fluctuating quite a bit over the past years,” Wyke said.

CORRECTION:
An earlier version of this article stated the system was handed the second-largest curtailment order. They were handed the third-largest.

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Related Posts:

• Baldacci cuts UM budget by $5.3M (November 20, 2008)
• Governor Baldacci cuts higher education funding (January 22, 2009)
• Governor requests climate change report from UMaine (November 29, 2007)
• Baldacci asks for $52M for higher education (February 2, 2009)
• Proposed funding increase for UMS ‘long overdue’ (February 5, 2007)

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