The University of Wisconsin-Madison would receive a slightly deeper cut than other state universities in Gov. Scott Walker's proposed budget, but would split from the UW System and be given more freedom to chart its future development.
UW-Milwaukee would be placed on a path to also break from the rest of the UW System. Walker's proposal calls for spending $250,000 over the biennium on developing a planned split.
The other state public universities would face 11% budget cuts and get none of the freedom or cost-savings tools.
In all, the UW System would face a $250 million cut over the biennium. The system had a $1.1 billion budget this fiscal year, equivalent to about $2.2 billion over two years. Half of that $250 million would come from UW-Madison's budget. The university, which has a $457 million annual appropriation - the equivalent of $914 million over the biennium - would take a roughly 13% cut.
In exchange, UW-Madison would get freedom from oversight by the UW System Board of Regents. It would gain flexibility to set tuition, manage pay and launch capital projects. UW-Madison officials have said such flexibility will help them offset some of the problems that would come with a big budget cut.
The governor's budget anticipates a 5.5% tuition increase for all UW System schools other than UW-Madison each of the next two years, the same tuition increase those schools had last year. Some schools, such as UW-Milwaukee, are allowed to charge a differential tuition on top of the systemwide increase. Those schools could continue that practice under the governor's proposal.
Walker's budget plan also cuts $71.6 million from the state's technical college system, about 30% of the system's funding, according to technical college system officials.
MATC President Michael L. Burke said the school would "continue to provide the education and training necessary to develop a workforce for Wisconsin" despite the proposed cuts.
Short-term pain
If the plan goes forward, UW-Madison would appoint a board that would set the university's tuition. UW-Madison officials raised the possibility of a 10% annual tuition increase. UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin said Tuesday the campus hadn't settled on a figure, but the goal was to avoid the 16% to 18% tuition increases that happened from 2003 to 2005, the last time the UW System had a $250 million biennial cut.
Martin and some UW System chancellors promoted Walker's proposal last week as a politically viable method of helping the state's flagship campus deal with deep state budget cuts they were expecting and to compete with other top public universities.
"In the short term, there's no way around the pain of this cut," Martin said Tuesday. But in the long term, the new tools will help to "preserve the strengths" of the campus, she said.
Martin said UW-Madison would continue to pursue joint ventures with UW-Milwaukee, the state's other doctoral-granting public university.
As rumors floated of a split for UW-Milwaukee last week, the school's interim chancellor, Mike Lovell, said there could be opportunities for his university, but also special challenges because the Milwaukee campus does not have the endowment or the research prowess of its Madison counterpart.
UW-Milwaukee spokesman Tom Luljak said the outlook was the same Tuesday. While thanking Walker for time and funding to study the issue, "we don't know what the impact of moving to a different governance system would be on our campus," he said.
The rest of the UW System schools have asked for similar flexibility so that they can more easily shift money to the areas where they need it most. Walker's plan would not immediately provide that flexibility, but the governor said he was open to changes to his plan.
In his speech, Walker noted years of requests from UW System leaders for more freedom from state rules.
"Now they will have it and soon the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee will as well," the governor said. "Throughout the budget process I am open to working with lawmakers from both political parties on expanding this concept to the other campuses throughout the University of Wisconsin system."
UW System leaders have said they were blindsided when parts of Walker's plans for the public universities started leaking a couple of weeks ago. Those administrators who run the UW System and some other chancellors worried that a split would damage a public university system that has been seen as a model since it was formed nearly 40 years ago.
UW-Oshkosh Chancellor Richard Wells was among five of the UW System's 14 chancellors who said last week he was against any breakup of UW System schools.
"It's reasonable to say competition for scarce resources is going to turn up," Wells said Tuesday. "Having two systems is going to be tough enough. If you have three, in my opinion, it makes it even tougher."
Push for affordability
Wells, who was lobbying lawmakers Tuesday in Madison, described the UW System as a fleet and argued UW-Madison no longer wants to be the flagship. UW-Madison receives 38% of the state UW System money to educate 23% of the system's students, Wells said. He argued that the gap likely will widen because UW-Madison's authority to set its own tuition also would squeeze the other UW System schools.
"Because a detached UW-Madison will be allowed to raise tuition as it sees fit, huge pressure will be placed on the abandoned fleet to remain 'affordable' " and hold down tuition at those institutions, he said.
The budget trims in Walker's plan spare financial aid for UW schools, technical colleges and students at private colleges. None of them takes a cut. Tuition reimbursement for veterans is also spared.
But the plan does end new enrollees in the Wisconsin Covenant, a $25 million-a-year plan from former Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle to give the state's best students additional financial aid to attend UW System schools.
Walker's budget also:
• Eliminates funding for the Lawton Undergraduate Minority Retention Grant that provides up to $2,500 for students at UW-Madison.
• Stops the UW System from letting some illegal immigrants pay in-state college tuition. Wisconsin high schools graduate 400 to 650 illegal immigrants annually and the Legislature approved letting those students pay in-state tuition rates in 2009.
Doyle cut more than $100 million from UW System budgets in the last biennium. That came before additional cuts ordered by Doyle as the state's budget situation worsened.