The Voice
Mulling through budget stories is one of the most challenging tasks I’ve had to conquer in my short career as a journalist. Sometimes budget clich?s of “bags of money,” “lay-offs” and “tuition increases” are like sugarplums dancing in my head before I sleep.
Now it’s solved. Well, kind of.
As of Oct. 13, there won’t be any mid-year tuition increases and Dr. Leland says GC&SU will most likely avoid lay-offs.
I never thought any of it was important, and I venture to say a number of students probably don’t care either. But as a student, a voter and a taxpayer in the state of Georgia, everything matters. When administrators talk about “the State” and “shifting the payroll,” it means someone is playing with our money.
It doesn’t matter if you work for the State or not, by the virtue of living in Georgia, you’re paying taxes that contribute to a giant fund that’s decreasing due to some very twisted decisions. I don’t know enough about Georgia politics to tell you how I feel about Sonny Perdue, but I know that something does seem out of place.
A shift in the payroll was planned and, according to Lt. Gov. Mark Taylor, proposed to the legislature by Gov. Purdue. Then, after seeing what could happen if the shift was made, he changed his mind.
A decision that created all this mess fell on the shoulders of one person? It’s the democratic way, but when you start talking about money, ideologies shift and confusion sets in. I continue to feel powerless, whether the situation has been solved or not.
Let’s look at the two ways we could have handled this money chaos: make students pay more or ask faculty and staff to leave by early retirement or by force. I’m not a proponent of cutting anyone’s salary, but do students realize how much some administrators are paid?
According to the Georgia Board of Regents, the highest administrator salary at GC&SU is over $150,000 a year and it seems most academic deans are making around $90,000 a year.
Plus, I’ve heard talk of a merit raise on top of these figures. Even though it’s supposed to be less than 1 percent more, all students were facing a10 percent increase in tuition. I don’t care if the “bag of money” holding the money for that raise is knotted in 400 ways. If untying it means leveling our plummeting budget, I don’t mind being the one to untangle it.
This is an important issue and it’s not going away. When students graduate and start full-time work in Georgia, this will be an even bigger issue. Learn the facts, go vote and make the decision ours, not theirs.
Bo Shell, Editor in Chief, The Colonnade
Posted by Colonnade Archives
on Oct 22 2004. Filed under Our Voice.
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