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Furloughs won’t affect student jobs

By Jesse Rangel

Monday, December 7, 2009

As the University rolls out its new furlough policy to patch any future budget holes, student employees and temporary faculty and staff at the lower rungs of pay will be exempted from any of those possible layoffs.

Diane Goddard, vice provost for finance and chairwoman of the furlough committee, said the idea of protecting employees at the lowest end of the salary structure came up quickly in committee meetings.

“Those are the people that we absolutely felt needed to be protected,” Goddard said. “And that included all student employees.”

Furloughs­ — reducing employees’ salaries by instituting temporary layoffs ­— might be one of the options the University uses as it braces for more bad budget news down the road from the state and the Board of Regents. Danny Anderson, interim provost and executive vice chancellor, said in an e-mail to faculty and staff Wednesday that the University did not anticipate the need to institute a furlough this fiscal year. However, he said it could be a possibility in the future.

Lori Reesor, associate vice provost for student success, said the issue of protecting student employees from furloughs was something everyone agreed on. She said her department employed a large number of students, and that shaped her perspective on protecting student jobs.

“If we furloughed staff, then who’s feeding the students in the residence halls? How do we manage just some really important basic services that we would be doing?” Reesor said.

Goddard said the committee thought those in the middle and higher end of the salary structure should be able to contribute more furlough days. She said the committee recommended four or five salary levels and completely excluded the lowest levels.

However, the current policy, which Anderson developed using the recommendations by the committee, had not yet made those divisions.

Mason Heilman, Lawrence senior and student body president, said though he appreciated the consensus on keeping student jobs away from furloughs, he also wanted to make sure the policy allowed full-time faculty members to spread their furlough days out. This would ensure that faculty aren’t forced to miss an important day of teaching or critical research.

“They’re both crucial parts of their jobs,” Heilman said.

Anderson said in a University budget forum Wednesday that the University would use furloughs to target immediate budget cuts from the Board of Regents. He said the University would adjust the amount of mandated furloughs to the amount the Regents cut from the University’s budget.

“We do not have a specific amount to know,” Anderson said.

Goddard said in the Wednesday meeting that each round of furloughs that asks top earners to take one to five days off would save the University $6.6 million.

— Edited by Amanda Thompson

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