To: All Faculty & All Academic Professionals & All Civil Service Staff
           <everybody@illinois.edu> 
    From: "uipres@uillinois.edu" <uipres@uillinois.edu>

Reply-To: uipres@uillinois.edu
 Subject: MASSMAIL - presmail

June 17, 2002



Dear Colleague:

	Despite our best efforts, the University of Illinois must cope 
with its most severe budget situation in decades. To do so, your 
university needs your understanding and your help. 
	We are deeply disappointed, of course, at the outcome of the 
Illinois legislature's special session. And yet we fully understand, 
intellectually, that the Illinois state budget was so woefully out of 
balance that our friends and allies in the legislature would have to give 
way to fulfill Illinois's constitutional mandate for a balanced budget.
	This has been an extraordinary time; we have spent virtually the 
last eight months absorbing a series of cuts and cost shifts. Thanks to 
the good work of the chancellors, provosts, deans, directors, and 
department heads from the three campuses, we had prepared budget scenarios 
with ever-escalating reductions and more severe impacts. We did not 
believe--or want to believe--that our final FY03 appropriation would 
approach our worst-case scenario. It did.
	Simplest put: the University of Illinois has an $89 million 
problem. That problem consists of two direct cuts into our appropriation 
that total $49 million; a $25 million cost shift of health insurance; and 
a short list, totaling $15 million, of mandatory costs, such as federal 
Medicare payments, utility price increases, and liability self-insurance. 
The $89 million represents about 9 percent of our state support, which 
itself is about one-third of our total operating budget. 
	The one-third, however, is critical to our important missions. It 
supports our basic obligations to our students and the citizens of 
Illinois. It pays most salaries and wages; puts books in the libraries; 
heats, lights, and cools our buildings; and the like. In sum, it is the 
essential day-to-day operating fund for our three campuses and other 
University of Illinois sites across the state. 
	You will be hearing more from your chancellors and provosts in the 
coming weeks about the specific steps those leaders must take to manage 
our way through the next year. This is a great university with a proud 
tradition of keeping our heads up and moving forward against all 
challenges. I ask for your patience and goodwill and thank you for both 
your hard work and your loyalty.


	
James J. Stukel
President
uipres@uillinois.edu
This mailing approved by:
The Office of the President

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