None of the nearly 40 members of the UUP Outreach Committee minced words about the challenges UUP and SUNY face during the committee’s retreat Nov. 6-7 in Albany. And the threat posed by flexibility is near the top of the committee’s worry list.

“Flexibility threatens to dismantle the public nature of the University,” UUP President Phillip Smith told committee members. “Selling or leasing campus property removes opportunities for future expansion of academic programs and services.”

The chances for final legislative approval of A./S.2020—the bill that would allow the University at Buffalo to sell or lease campus property and charge differential tuition—have waned, committee members were told. But another bill, S.5836, is lurking on the horizon. The bill would allow similar provisions at SUNY’s other university centers—Stony Brook, Binghamton and Albany—as well as at SUNY teaching hospitals in Brooklyn and Syracuse.

“Not many people have been talking against it,” said Outreach Committee Co-chair Glenn McNitt.

Over and above the governor’s $90 million midyear budget reduction for SUNY, Smith warned the University faces the prospect of more cuts down the road, citing that federal stimulus funds run out in 2012, and higher state tax rates on the wealthy end the following year.

“We in Albany can’t do it alone,” Smith said in an appeal for increased participation in advocacy activities. “Lawmakers have to hear from the grassroots.”

Committee members debated the form and content of the union’s 2010 Legislative Agenda that will be submitted to the Executive Board for final approval.

Following that discussion, McNitt closed the retreat with a charge to the committee.

“We should leave here knowing we’re better organized,” he said. “Develop a list of groups in the community you can talk to about our mutual concerns, and know what you’re going to say to them.”

— Donald Feldstein