The governor and state lawmakers reached agreement on a new state budget before the April 1 deadline, but the content of the 2011-12 budget was not exactly what UUP had hoped for.

UUP refuses to throw in the towel.

With the Legislature scheduled to be in session through June 20, the union looked to galvanize support among lawmakers to pass a supplemental state budget that includes funds restoring SUNY budget cuts.

The governor’s proposed $100 million reduction for SUNY remained intact in the final state budget. That raised the total cut to SUNY’s operating aid to nearly $700 million during the past three years, meaning that state support for SUNY has been sliced by one-third.

The outcome proved slightly more encouraging when it came to SUNY’s three teaching hospitals, which had faced the elimination of their state support in the governor’s budget. In the final budget, lawmakers restored $60 million of the $154 million cut aimed at the hospitals in the Executive Budget, and the hospitals will amortize—in other words, reschedule—pension payments for a current-year savings of $24 million.

“This level of restoration of state support is nearly unprecedented,” UUP President Phil Smith said. “But we need to keep pressing for additional restorations to enable SUNY’s hospitals to continue providing vital health care services for thousands of uninsured and underinsured New Yorkers, as well as work to restore funding to our campuses.”

UB 2020 ALTERNATIVE

Proponents of UB 2020 fell short of their goal to have the controversial plan included in the budget, but the proposal was still lurking in early May when the governor presented a scaled-down version of UB 2020 called NYSUNY 2020. In contrast to the original UB 2020 plan that called for $5 billion in construction, NYSUNY 2020 would offer up to $35 million in capital funds to each of the four SUNY University Centers as “seed money.”

UUP had actively sought to stop UB 2020, and Smith said UUP has serious reservations about portions of NYSUNY 2020.

“This proposal could permit the four University Centers to impose differential tuition. That could deny access to tens of thousands of students from low-income households,” Smith said as details of the plan were still emerging. “Potentially, that increased tuition could be used to fund public/private partnerships. We don’t think it’s fair to force students to line the pockets of private businesses.”

UB 2020 emerged as one of UUP’s major targets as union advocates headed back to Albany with a revised legislative agenda.

SEEKING A REVERSAL OF FORTUNE

UUP’s revised agenda also urges lawmakers to pass an amended budget to reverse the massive cuts to SUNY campuses and hospitals.

UUPer Barry Trachtenberg of UAlbany presented a personal account of how deeply SUNY has been cut.

“When I started in 2003, I was one of five faculty in Judaic studies. Now we’re down to one faculty member—me,” he said during a legislative visit.

UUPers also pressed lawmakers to extend the millionaire’s tax to raise additional revenue that could be used to restore funds to SUNY.

The union’s advocates planned on pursuing these issues during the NYSUT Committee of 100 Advocacy Day May 10.

UNITED FOR HIGHER ED

UUP activists also worked for restorations prior to the budget vote. In addition to making personal visits to legislators, UUPers joined nearly 2,000 of their sisters and brothers from NYSUT— UUP’s statewide affiliate—the Professional Staff Congress representing CUNY faculty, PEF and CSEA for “A Rally for Public Ed” outside the state Capitol. UUP President Smith was among more than a dozen speakers addressing the rally on a blustery, late winter’s day. All asked that funding for education be restored in the budget and an extension of the millionaire’s tax.

Smith also worked in partnership with SUNY Student Assembly President Julie Gondar. The two co-wrote a letter to the editor of the Albany Times Union calling for adoption of a rational tuition plan for the state university.

But Smith cautioned that any such tuition plan must be accompanied by an increase in the maximum Tuition Assistance Program grant.

The budget fight is not over. UUPers are urged to send letters to lawmakers via the union’s website and its advocacy site at www.savesuny.org, asking them to restore funding for SUNY and its hospitals in the supplemental budget.

— Donald Feldstein