2008 Woodie Awards
In wake of budget cuts, full disclosure of university's money spending needed
Issue date: 11/10/05 Section: Opinion/Editorial
Just like that, budget cuts became a reality. On Nov. 8, budget cuts of $2.5 million for Webster campuses worldwide were made public to students at a Student Government Association meeting. Nearly $200,000 is being immediately cut from student affairs, leaving little money to carry out programming for the rest of the academic year. Administrators have said no more money will be available until the start of the next fiscal year, June 1, 2006.
Rumors of budget cuts have been looming like storm clouds over the horizon since the beginning of the school year, but the lightning fast quickness with which the administration just pulled the rug out from under students is absolutely absurd.
At The Journal we've said it before and we're going to yell it once more: The university needs to release its budget information. As a tuition driven university, the school owes it to students to let us know where our money is being spent, especially now as the budget is truly falling to pieces.
Tuition is down as enrollment at our military campuses falls. Soldiers have been deployed, leaving few behind to take classes at our campuses. There isn't much administrators can do about that. What they can do is re-evaluate where the shrinking amount of money they do have is going.
First there were the budget over-runs of the construction of Marletto's Marketplace. That boondoggle, while it made for a very nice place to eat, could end up costing the university nearly $2 million. Administrators are fighting a lawsuit brought by unpaid contractors. Everything about that project smells of mismanagement and could cost the university more than a million dollars it can't afford to spend.
Now the new dorms are under construction, the Old Post Office is getting the revamping of a lifetime thanks to Webster, money is going to build up foreign campuses and though the Community Music School building was just sold, the money from its sale is going toward construction of a new building on campus.
Rumors of budget cuts have been looming like storm clouds over the horizon since the beginning of the school year, but the lightning fast quickness with which the administration just pulled the rug out from under students is absolutely absurd.
At The Journal we've said it before and we're going to yell it once more: The university needs to release its budget information. As a tuition driven university, the school owes it to students to let us know where our money is being spent, especially now as the budget is truly falling to pieces.
Tuition is down as enrollment at our military campuses falls. Soldiers have been deployed, leaving few behind to take classes at our campuses. There isn't much administrators can do about that. What they can do is re-evaluate where the shrinking amount of money they do have is going.
First there were the budget over-runs of the construction of Marletto's Marketplace. That boondoggle, while it made for a very nice place to eat, could end up costing the university nearly $2 million. Administrators are fighting a lawsuit brought by unpaid contractors. Everything about that project smells of mismanagement and could cost the university more than a million dollars it can't afford to spend.
Now the new dorms are under construction, the Old Post Office is getting the revamping of a lifetime thanks to Webster, money is going to build up foreign campuses and though the Community Music School building was just sold, the money from its sale is going toward construction of a new building on campus.