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The Blue
Banner
Features
Panic fall tour plays like a ‘Sex
Machine’
Opinions
‘Let’s make that stock go down’
■ see page 4
Sports
Volleyball loses to Liberty in BSC semis
■ see page 3
Volume 36 Issue 12
Departments
navigate state
budget cuts
The University of North Carolina at Asheville
Michelle Dean
News Reporter
Campus departments and organi
zations received their final operat
ing budgets for the current fiscal in
late November. Before the final
budgets arrived, departments cal
culated their spending based on
projections of the funding they ex
pected to receive.
“We had been told at the meeting
of department chairs and program
directors that the average academic
operating budget cut would be 32
percent,” said Lisa Friedenberg,
psychology department chair.
“There was a misunderstanding or
a calculation error and the cuts were
only 22 percent.
“The cut was smaller than we an
ticipated, but it was still a really
significant cut. If you take a fifth of
the operating budget out, you’re
going to have to make some serious
changes in the way you fund things.”
Academic departments pay for
their own use of pap.er, postage,
travel and even telephones, accord
ing to Friedenberg.
“I think one of the things that
people don’t necessarily realize is
that the academic departments have
to pay for everything,” said
Friedenberg. “We purchase paper
from the university’s central stores.
When we Xerox, we pay per copy to
printing services. We pay for chalk,
postage and our telephones. So,
although the university may appear
See DEPARTMENTS Page 6
Snow days give breakfrom books
STUART GAINES/NEWS EDITOR
STUART GAINES/NEWS EDITOR
Classes were cancelled by 11 a.m. Nov. 4, and with more winter weather expected, the last week of classes may soon be obsolete. Above,
sophomore John Inglese and junior Thomas Greenwood (above left, left to right) begin work on their snowman. Senior Hollie Childers
and junior Dearborn McCorkle (above right, left to right) pose with the finished product as snow continued falling on the quad.
State budget cuts tighten spending campus-wide
Sara Miller
News Reporter
Campus departments and organi
zations received their final operat
ing budgets for the current fiscal in
late November. Before the final
budgets arrived, departments cal
culated their spending based on
projections of the funding they ex
pected to receive.
“We had been told at the meeting
of department chairs and program
directors that the average academic
operating budget cut would be 32
percent,” said Lisa Friedenberg,
psychology department chair.
“There was a misunderstanding or
a calculation error and the cuts were
only 22 percent.
“The cut was smaller than we an
ticipated, but it was still a really
significant cut. If you take a fifth of
the operating budget out, you re
going to have to make some serious
changes in the way you fund things.”
Academic departments pay for
their own use of paper, postage,
travel and even telephones, accord
ing to Friedenberg.
“I think one of the things that
people don’t necessarily realize is
that the academic departments have
to pay for everything,” said
Friedenberg. “We purchase paper
from the university’s central stores.
When we Xerox, we pay per copy to
printing services. We pay for chalk,
postage and our telephones. So,
although the university may appear
to be a big storehouse of resources,
academic departments are actually
making purchases.”
Despite the lack of concrete bud
get figures early in the semester,
department chairs collected infor
mation from within their depart
ments to gain a general idea about
how to form spending habits, ac
cording to Friedenberg.
Until the departments received
their budget figures, department
chairs operated on a money-trans-
fer system for purchases within the
university.
“What we’re in the process of do
ing right now is subtracting what ■
we’ve already spent from what we
were just allocated,” said
Friedenberg. “We had been allowed
to go ahead and get the things that
we needed through internal money
transfers, so we have to subtract
some things out and see what we
have left to work with.”
For some departments, budget
cuts mean fewer resources and big
ger classes.
“We had always hoped here that
we could teach a small number of
classes at a level of high quality and
not teach massive numbers,” said
Pamela Laughon, psychology pro
fessor. “Now some of my classes are
over 30. The hmit is set at 25, but
I can’t keep people out because they
need the classes. So, I always sign a
lot of people in.”
“We had always hoped here that we could teach
a small number of classes at a level of high quality
and not teach massive numbers. Now some of my
classes are over 30. The limit is set at 25, but I cant
keep people out because they need the classes. So, I
always sign a lot of people in. ”
-Pamela Laughon,
psycology department
Some students dislike larger class
“Staff have been cut, and 1 have
larger classes now,” said Kelly Tay
lor, an undeclared freshman. “It’s
harder for the professors to get as
personal or as one-on-one as I’d
like them to be.”
Budget cuts forced the university
to cut many classes this year, creat
ing schedule problems and frustra
tion among students.
“There was a class that I really
wanted to take that I was very ex
cited about and it got cancelled
because of the budget,” said Sarah
Cleveland, a senior sociology ma
jor. “It wasn’t a core course but I
thought that it would have been
really cool. They had to cancel it
right before the semester started
and I’d already had it scheduled.”
Despite departmental budget cuts,
the price of goods continues to rise.
“We have fewer dollars this year
than last year, and last year we had
fewer dollars than the year before,”
said Friedenberg. “Of course, noth
ing is getting cheaper. It has to
affect something.”
For department chairs like
Friedenberg, the arrival of budget
figures means the chairs must de
cide where to make cuts.
“What do I cut? Do I buy less
paper? Do I let people travel to
meetings less? Do I bring in fewer
guest speakers? Something has to
give,” said Friedenberg. “It’s really
hard to just adopt an across the
board strategy of cutting everything
by the same amount. Some areas
end up taking bigger hits than oth-
Weighing financial priorities has
led to complete cuts in some areas,
according to Friedenberg.
“The area of complete cut for my
department was honoraria for guest
speakers,” said Friedenberg. “For
tunately, some speakers have agreed
to come without compensation.
The other area that is going to be
hit pretty hard will be computer
and software upgrades.
“Other kinds of curricular sup
port such as films and videos won’t
be ordered because those are things
that we can more easily do with-
Uncertainty over funding cuts for
technology throughout the univer
sity caused students in several de
partments to speculate over the ef
fects possible changes.
“There was fear that the computer
center would cut jobs or hours,”
said computer lab assistant]onathan
Meadows. “They did end up clos
ing one outlying lab, but no posi-
Ramsey Library also cut several of
its less used electronic databases, as
well as print-media journals.
“After analyzing journal-use sta
tistics, we realized that some jour
nals weren’t being used very much,
and were costing as much as $50
per use,” said librarian Jim
Kuhlman. “Some of the journals in
chemistry and technology cost up
wards of $6,000 per year. So, we
consulted with department faculty
to cut the resources that were less of
a necessity.”
About $40,000 worth of journals
were cut this year according to
December 5, 2002
College for
seniors student
arrested, small
handgun found
Christina Clayton
News Reporter
UNCA public safety arrested a
:ollege for seniors student Nov. 11,
first charging him with larceny and
then possession and concealment
of a firearm.
UNCA public safety charged Rob-
:rt Bruce Frederick, 65, of Asheville
with larceny, and arrested him after
1 student reported seeing Frederick
digging up plants on campus, near
Rarnsey library.
After Frederick’s arrest, public
safety discovered a firearm inside
his car, and then added possession
and concealment of a firearm to
Frederick’s charges.
“It’s frustrating. The grounds
crew put a lot of themselves into
their work, and the campus looks
great for the manpower we have.
That’s because they care,” said
Stephen Baxley, director of facili
ties management and planning. “It
takes the wind out • of your sails
when someone comes in and dis
mantles what you’ve been working
so hard to do.”
After the report of suspicious ac
tivity to the dispatcher, public safety
officer Steve Metcalf went to the
Ramsey Library area, according to
Caliendo.
“He saw that person near Zaiger
Hall with what he believed to be
plants,” said Lou Caliendo, the di
rector of public safety. “He did a
field interview, and deteripi red that
this person did not have permission
to take these plants.
Officer Metcalf was unable to com
ment because the case was still un
der investigation.
“When his vehicle was towed, they
found a firearm in the vehicle,”
Caliendo. “It was a small c aliber, I
believe a. 32 caliber semi-automatic
pistol.”
After public safety arrested and
charged Frederick, Caliendo said
that Frederick’s car was towed and
the handgun was found. He was
then charged with possession of,
and concealing a weapon.
“The gentlemen was cooperative
throughout the whole incident,”
said Caliendo.
The case was still under investiga
tion, according to Caliendo, be
cause of past incidences of stolen
landscaping materials.
“We received reports from facili
ties management and grounds
workers several weeks in a row of
larceny of landscaping materials,
plants and things of that nature,”
said Caliendo.
Previous incidents involving sto
len plants occurred in the same
area, around Zaiger Hall and
Ramsey Library, according to Me
lissa Acker, landscape director.
Acker did not know what kind of
plants Frederick allegedly stole.
“In the past incidents it was pe
rennials,” said Acker.
Some may feel that property of
the state belongs to them.
“There are folks who have the
attitude that if it is state property it
belongs to the taxpayers,” said
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