Sacramento State faculty members voiced their opinions and questions about the Budget Task Force’s report while the task force itself did its best to answer the questions as objectively as possible, sometimes not being able to answer them at all.

The report itself was very clear in the facts that were found. In fact, as far as transparency goes, it was a pleasant surprise to members of the senate to see a report as concisely factual as the one the Budget Task Force presented.

“This is the first time in my 20 years at Sac State that the faculty have actually peaked underneath the tent and seen the money in a way, that I think, we will actually be able to understand,” Faculty Senate President, Michael Fitzgerald said.

The report did raise many questions as to the allocation of funds, or in some instances lack-there-of, and why funds were being utilized the way that they were.

Board member and mathematics professor Scott Farrand said in their findings there was a discrepancy between what the task force learned about the budget estimates in August of 2006 and what Sac State President Alexander Gonzalez said to the senate when the budget became known.

“The president’s response to the senate’s resolution asking how that happened; that we weren’t told, was not what the task force came to understand,” Farrand said.

“We don’t know; we don’t have an explanation for that; we didn’t call the president to ask what he meant.”

The academic program seemed to be at the forefront of many faculty members list of concerns.

“I think it cuts to the heart of the decision making, and it’s something that we will be talking about more intimately,” Fitzgerald said.

The mandatory increased costs in baseline allocations to the structural deficit had taken on a minor role in the budgetary report. It left some professors a little confused as to the connections between what the president had to say about the allocations and why its role wasn’t more significant in the report.

“At the end of the day, one of the recommendations we can make whatever the case may be,” Farrand said. “Perhaps better communication between the president and the faculty should be something observed in the future.”

For now it would seem that, despite best wishes, budgetary cut backs and increased student fees are an inevitability that students and faculty are going to have to face.

Vice Chair of the Senate committee and ethnic studies professor, James Sobredo pointed out that everyone including faculty, students and administrators must work together to better understand the budget they have to work with.

“Because the way the state operates, we will see a rollercoaster budget,” Sobredo said.

“It’s not good; we have to make changes,” Sobredo said. “We’re at a crossroads to make fundamental changes at this college.”

Sobredo emphasized that students should take the time to better understand the budget especially, and look at how student fees contribute to the general funds the university receives.

“I’m working at putting something good out there,” Sobredo said. “I hope we move in the right direction.”

Josh Staab can be reached at [email protected]