Olympia Update No.
10 for the 2003 Legislative Session
June 6, 2003
From: Larry Ganders,
Assistant to the President
925 Plum St. SE - Building 4, P.O. Box 43165, Olympia, WA 98504-3165
WSU
BUDGETS SQUIRT FROM THE PRESSURES OF A SPECIAL SESSION
Await
Action by Governor Gary Locke
A
$375.2 million biennial operating budget and a new $118 million capital
construction budget for Washington State University squirted out of the state
Legislature after more than 130 days of session this year.
With a glum new
revenue forecast rumored to be pending, a special session scheduled to end
Tuesday, a new biennium about to begin in 25 days, and June weather temperatures
rising to July levels - the pressure to wrap up legislative business began
clamping down on the government process like it was a tube of toothpaste.
Thursday, the state budgets that had been churning inside since January finally
gushed out. A House-Senate compromise operating budget that finally squeezed out
Wednesday afternoon won a nearly immediate endorsement from the
Republican-controlled state Senate. The Senate vote was 28-19 just after 9 p.m.
Wednesday on the operating budget compromise, Engrossed Substitute Senate Bill
5404. It was the first day back in Olympia for three weeks for legislators who
weren't directly involved in negotiations.
It set in motion a stream of
legislation that shot from both Houses Thursday, washing up work on virtually
all legislation affecting the university as the Legislature winds up its special
session next Monday or Tuesday. The state House of Representatives finished the
job with an unusual 67-30 vote Thursday. With support from majority Democrats
lagging, the vote was expected to be close. In the end, 39 Republicans crossed
party lines to vote with 28 Democrats to pass the operating budget. Later
Thursday, the House and Senate announced and quickly passed a compromise capital
construction budget and associated bills.
Operating
Budget cuts WSU $20 Million or about 5.2 percent.
The compromise budget, which provides $6.8 million less for WSU than the House
originally adopted, and $12.4 million more than the Senate version, solves a
$2.6 billion state funding crisis with no new taxes.
It represents a 5.2 percent
reduction in overall state spending for WSU, some of which can be made up with a
tuition increase. It is a substantial improvement for WSU over the Senate budget
that many thought would ultimately pass the Legislature. House Democratic
negotiators worked hard for improvements in higher education. They are
Appropriations Chair Helen Sommers, D-Seattle, and Rep. Bill Fromhold,
D-Vancouver.
The WSU budget receives $1.5 million in replacement funds for
veterinary medicine, more than $800,000 for wine industry education, $1.35
million for a Vancouver Engineering and Science Institute in the compromise.
There are no general salary increases and employees will pay more for health
benefits, but WSU will receive $2.9 million of a $10 million recruitment and
retention pool for higher education. Lawmakers presumed that WSU and other
institutions will minimize the impact of the budget cut with a tuition increase,
they provided for increases of up to 7 percent for resident undergraduate
students. The WSU Board of Regents is preparing to meet next week to set the
rates for students this fall.
Capital
Budget Proposal Resembles the Senate proposal:
Funds Johnson and Cleveland Halls. Highlights
of the capital construction budget for WSU includes $35.2 million for a new
Plant Biosciences Addition to Johnson Hall in Pullman, the highest legislative
priority of the university. The final budget (Substitute Senate Bill 5401) is
very similar to the capital budget fashioned by Sen. Joe Zarelli, R-Ridgefield,
that passed the state Senate initially.
The Johnson Hall Addition has been in
the works for many years and the persistent lobbying interests promoting
biotechnology, particularly by the state wheat industry, will now mean that
construction begins this year.
Another long-delayed Pullman project is the
$11.16 million addition to Cleveland Hall for the College of Education.
Cleveland was funded in the Senate budget but not the House.
The budget provided
for one of the first state-funded buildings at a WSU experiment station in many
years, a $1.5 million multi-purpose building for WSU Prosser. It also provides
$4.3 million in infrastructure construction at WSU Vancouver that will allow for
co-location of a community college building on the campus that will house Clark
College programs.
The final capital construction budget also provides for design
funding for a new Pullman Biotechnology/Life Sciences building, a Tri-Cities
Bio-products and Sciences Building, and a new nursing building at Riverpoint to
replace the Magnuson Building near Spokane Falls Community College.
There is
also authority in the budget for WSU to proceed with pre-design for a number of
projects that could be ready for construction in four or more years. Eligible
projects include a Biomedical Science building, renovation of Holland Library,
and the Pullman Hospital.
Most troubling for WSU in the final capital budget, is
the uncertainty created by the manner in which it funds small construction
improvements on campus and equipment. The final budget adopted the Senate
position of providing generous amounts of funding to target “preservation”
and “safety” of buildings, $42 million for WSU. However, funding provided
explicitly for minor capital improvements (MCI) and large equipment is very
small. MCI projects allow renovation of classrooms and laboratories that become
outdated or do not meet accreditation criteria. Funding for major equipment
purchase, WSUnet computer server backbones, and MCI were funded by the House at
about $20.5 million. The final budget provides only $4.38 million to address these
issues.
No funding was
provided for the Spokane Academic Center at Riverpoint or the Pullman Wastewater
Treatment project. The Pullman project had been funded in the House budget.
