LINCOLN, Neb.—University of Nebraska administrators plan to eliminate 56 positions at the flagship campus in Lincoln to deal with a budget shortfall that is also expected to lead to cuts at other locations within the four-campus system.
University of Nebraska-Lincoln Chancellor Harvey Perlman announced the cuts Wednesday, calling them painful but not as deep as those being made at similar universities across the country. Twenty-eight people will lose their jobs under the plan, because many of the positions are already vacant. Two of the lost jobs are faculty jobs, and those are among the vacant positions.
The plan must first be approved by an academic affairs committee, which isn’t expected to consider it until late summer or early fall.
“I don’t think you’ll find any of these reductions will diminish the quality of education,” Perlman said.
The Lincoln campus faces a $3.7 million budget shortfall, a little more than 1 percent of its total budget. The university system as a whole faces an $8.5 million shortfall.
Unlike in some other states, the shortfall in the Nebraska system is caused by higher spending on salaries, benefits, financial aid and key academic and research areas, not because of less funding from the state. Overall, spending at University of Nebraska campuses will increase about 2.4 percent, and the system received a 1.5 percent increase in funding from lawmakers and Gov. Dave Heineman.
Tuition for undergraduates at the Lincoln, Omaha and Kearney campuses will rise 4 percent, the smallest increase in more than a decade.
Perlman said the job cuts at UNL were targeted at programs on the “periphery” of the university. In some cases, he said, those programs can make up the money elsewhere, such as through fundraising.
“We know what our priorities are and we’re not going to stray from them,” he said.
Among the proposed cuts at UNL:
— $489,000 by reducing by a quarter funding for researchers who help scientists in the school’s Agricultural Research Division. Fourteen vacant positions would not be filled.
— $277,000 by cutting programs and making changes in the College of Arts and Sciences.
— $260,000 by removing all state support for the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum. Funding could be replaced as the group merges with the Nebraska Forest Service.
— $309,000 by axing state funding for the Public Policy Center except for salary and benefits of the executive director.
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University of Nebraska-Lincoln proposed budget cuts:
