University budget conflicts unresolved

Monday, May 16, 2005 | 9:44 a.m.

The Assembly Ways and Means closed the higher education operating budget on Friday without resolving some of the conflicts between the Assembly committee's decisions and the Senate's.

Assembly members again voted down a governor's recommendation to allow the universities to keep all of the overhead cost money they receive with research grants, which the Senate previously approved in a joint committee meeting. Currently, the universities pay back 25 percent of those funds to the state.

Assembly members did vote to approve funding for the fourth year of the dental school but cut some of the staffing requested, Assemblywoman Chris Giunchigliani, D-Las Vegas, said. Assembly members also approved a pay grade increase for university police.

The Senate Finance members approved both measures in a joint committee last week.

The full Assembly committee also concurred with an earlier vote to keep the university system's formula funding at 84 percent. The system is funded based on three-year, rolling enrollment averages. The governor had used overestimated enrollment predictions when he created his budget.

System officials had lobbied to keep the $23.5 million in extra funding from the governor's projections, but assembly members said that money should go back into the general fund for other needs.

"Their enrollment went down," Giunchigliani said. "They are not getting a cut by actions taken by us, they just don't get to keep overinflated dollars."

Overall, the system will likely end up with a 10 percent increase in its budget over last year, she said.

In the full committee on Friday, Assembly members did create an equity pool for the Community College of Southern Nevada to offset some of the money it will lose without "monkeying with the formula," Giunchigliani said. The money will help CCSN increase the salaries of its part-time faculty, which is affecting the overall formula.

Senate Finance members on the joint committee had also supported keeping the formula at 84 percent, but said they wanted to wait and see what other decisions were made before making their final decision.

Senate members also said they wanted to use some of that $23.5 million toward the budget enhancements requested by the system. Assembly members did not vote on any of the enhancements.