Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1964 [PAGE 406]

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1963]

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

361

Comment Operating Budget The major differences between the Trustees' request for an increase in operating funds and the amounts recommended by the Board of Higher Education are in two items: salary increases and the requirements for maintaining the present level of services with increased enrollments and increased costs. The Board of Trustees, mindful of the University's position in relationship to salary levels at similar universities across the land, and resolving to improve the relative position of the University of Illinois, recommended an amount equal to 9 per cent of the academic personal service budget in the first year of the biennium and 5 per cent in the second. The Board of Higher Education recommended an increase in the academic salary budget of 6 per cent for the first year of the biennium and S per cent in the second. The Board of Higher Education, no less than the Board of Trustees, is aware of the necessity for salary improvement. The difference here is one of judgment as to rate of progress and rate of improvement. The other major difference is in the amount estimated as required for maintaining the present level of services. Here again, the difference is in judgment rather than on policy or objective, and a reconciliation of points of view should be possible in future years from studies of the specific items involved. Capital Budget The difference between the Board of Trustees' request and the Board of Higher Education's action on the capital budget may be accounted for largely in the omission of the following four building projects: At Urbana-Champaign — office-classroom building and the addition to Smith Music Hall, and at the Medical Center, Chicago — addition to the East DentistryMedicine-Pharmacy Building and the Physical Plant Service Building. It may be said that variations in estimates of enrollment capacity and enrollment projections account in part for the differences in point of view as to the urgency of the two buildings eliminated at the Urbana campus. The two buildings eliminated at the Medical Center campus are, in the judgment of the administration and the Trustee members of the Board of Higher Education, of unquestioned importance to the improvement and development of that campus. Nonetheless, the sense of urgency about the need for these four structures was not shared by our colleagues on the Board of Higher Education, and further discussions will no doubt be held concerning these items in the future. Recommendation W e believe that the original budget requests of the Board of Trustees were fully justified, in the light of the total needs of the University, and of the needs of the state for University of Illinois services. At the same time, we believe that the Board of Higher Education has an important role to play in the future welfare of higher education in the state of Illinois and that cooperative support from the governing boards of the state universities should be brought to the decisions of the Board of Higher Education at this time. W e believe that most of the differences are in judgment, not objectives, and that these differences can be reconciled by additional studies during the next biennium, when there will be more time for interchange of ideas, consultation, and analysis of data. Further, the "master plan" studies which are now going forward under the auspices of the Board of Higher Education should be helpful in evaluations which are to be made in the future. Accordingly, in the interest of encouraging coordination in higher education in the state of Illinois, we recommend that the recommendations of the Board of Higher Education with reference to the budgets for operation of the University of Illinois and for capital projects be endorsed as reflecting the official position of the Board of Trustees. We further recommend that the representatives of the Board of Trustees and the administration of the University be authorized to present this position to the appropriate state officials and members of the General Assembly, hence modifying the original budget requests as presented in November. O n m o t i o n of M r . W i l l i a m s o n , t h e f o r e g o i n g r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s a n d t h e a d j u s t m e n t s i n t h e o p e r a t i n g a n d c a p i t a l b u d g e t s , a s s h o w n in t h e