With the state’s higher education institutions in the crosshairs of Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration—which has threatened to cut as much as $300 million from their budgets in order to help plug an estimated $1.4 billion shortfall—LSU President and Chancellor F. King Alexander told Daily Report this week that he’s “working behind the scenes to mitigate this as much as possible.”
As a practical matter, Alexander says a $300 million cut could mean the loss of an estimated 300 faculty members across the state, as well as the loss of $130 million in research dollars and nearly 50% fewer science, technology, engineering and mathematics—or STEM—graduates. For LSU’s flagship campus in Baton Rouge alone, such cuts would amount to some $60 million, according to Alexander.
“If this comes to fruition it will be devastating for all higher ed in the state,” Alexander says.
On a brighter note, Alexander says the recent authority LSU received from the Joint Legislative Budget Committee to do its own procurement when making bulk purchases will save LSU more than $5 million this year.
“This is big,” he says. “We’ve been working on this for three years, and it’s more important now than ever with the financial situation the state is facing.”
Also this week, the Greater Baton Rouge Association of Realtors released year-end figures for 2014 home sales. While East Baton Rouge Parish sales were flat, total home sales in the eight-parish Capital Region for 2014 finished 3.2% higher than in 2013, aided by a strong December in which area sales jumped by 6.4% compared to the same month the previous year.
“There’s no reason to think that 2015 isn’t going to be another really strong year,” says GBRAR President Donna Wolff. “Our economy is really strong, our job market is extremely healthy and if interest rates stay low like they have been—and the predictions are that they may not really climb until the end of the year—I don’t see why 2015 won’t be even better than this year.”
Read the complete Daily Report Week in Review.
—Steve Sanoski
