Top UNM officials are gearing up for what so far appears to be an uphill battle with the state Legislature in January to fulfill the University's legislative priorities.
One major topic at Tuesday's Board of Regents meeting was a rift between what UNM wants and what the state may give regarding salary raises for faculty and staff and tuition increases.
Under New Mexico's system, faculty and staff raises are offset by tuition credits.
A tuition credit is the predetermined percentage of revenue that is subtracted from the instruction and general formula funding in order to calculate the State General Fund Appropriation for any New Mexico institution of higher education.
The University is pushing for a 5 percent raise for faculty and staff and no percent tuition credit. But the popular perception is that such requests will be a tall order in the predicted upcoming tight budget year.
"We're going to be very active with the Legislature," Regent President Jamie Koch said. "We plan to use every single resource we have at our disposal to get some of these things accomplished."
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Koch encouraged ASUNM, GPSA and Alumni Association leaders to use their resources to help convince legislators that the University's teachers and other employees need to be better compensated, but the money shouldn't necessarily come from students' pockets.
Both student governments and the Alumni Association could provide manpower to lobby for their own interests and for the University's during UNM Day at the Legislature Jan. 26, Koch said.
An obstacle standing in UNM's way is that the Commission on Higher Education voted Nov. 14 to recommend a very different pay raise and tuition credit package to the Legislature - and it could prove insurmountable.
The CHE will recommend that New Mexico's faculty and staff receive a 3 percent salary raise and that a 4 percent tuition credit be instituted.
Beverly Burris, president of the Faculty Senate and a member of the CHE, said she lobbied the commission to adopt UNM's proposal, but to no avail.
The commission found the University's proposal unwieldy, and said even the 3 percent raise may go down and 4 percent credit may increase, said Burris, who did not vote because some members of the CHE thought her involvement might be a conflict of interest.
"I didn't find anyone who liked the tuition credit system," she said. "But there just wasn't anyone else willing to speak out."
