Program directors and students were upset and in disbelief over a proposal from the Legislative Finance Committee that outlines budget cuts to 62 University programs, including African-American Student Services and El Centro de la Raza.
The proposed cuts range from 3 percent to 100 percent - with a bulk of the campus' ethnic programs recommended to lose all their legislative funding.
The Institute for American Indian Research, African-American Studies, Latin American and Iberian Institute, Latin American Resources and Outreach Center, and many others could lose funding for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2010.
Josephine De Leon, vice president of Equity and Inclusion, said the recommended cuts must go through the House and Senate and be signed by Gov. Bill Richardson before they can take effect. The Legislative Finance Committee's proposal will go before the House Feb. 12.
Additional proposals will be made before then, she said.
"There are two sets of recommendations," De Leon said. "One set of recommendations is coming from the Department of Finance Administration - basically the governor's office - and the other one is coming from the Legislative Finance Committee, and so we don't know ultimately what recommendations (the Legislature) will go with, but we believe that they'll go with the recommendations of the Legislative Finance Committee."
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De Leon said the committee is probably looking for a way to prevent its financial problems from slowing down research programs.
"I think that they looked at the research and public-service projects as probably the easiest way to deal with the deficit that they're facing," De Leon said. "They see that as gravy money, when in reality, it's not gravy funding for some of these programs that have over the years subsisted through that funding."
Veronica Mendez-Cruz, director of El Centro de la Raza, said this is not the first time her program has faced potential budget cuts.
"We have encountered a variety of cuts throughout the years.. The Legislature at one point or another has cut some of our funding, and then the University, through harvesting and a variety of other aspects, has also cut our funding," she said.
Mendez-Cruz said the consequences of these budget cuts would affect the whole University.
"This is huge," she said. "This will translate, for us, (into) drastically cutting services to our students, our community. It will mean possibly laying off two to three staff folks here because the funding I receive from the Legislature pretty much is everything that we do here."
Mendez-Cruz said El Cento de la Raza only receives enough money from the University to cover her paycheck and the paycheck of her administrator. The rest of the program is dependent on the funds it receives from Santa Fe.
"Everything we do here is all legislative-bound, so without that support, we will be left with cutting services to anywhere between 3,000 to 4,000 students," Mendez-Cruz said.
Laura Harris, executive director of Americans for Indian Opportunity, said the Legislature and UNM administration are not taking into account how crucial some of the ethnic programs are to students.
"I think these cuts could be devastating for students of color," Harris said. "UNM prides itself on having a large acceptance rate of Native Americans, but then we find that Native Americans and other students of color have a large drop-out rate after their freshman year or their second semester, and the only way to help these kids stay in school are programs like these."
GPSA President Chris Ramirez said he was in awe when he saw that the Legislative Finance Committee was recommending cutting 100 percent of funding for some ethnic programs.
"I feel, personally, that students-of-color programs are being more negatively impacted," Ramirez said. "Let's be real: Some of the programs are being proposed for very small cuts - 3 percent. Athletics is only being proposed for a 3 percent cut. I think it should be fair."
Bernadette Foster, administrative assistant for African-American Student Services, said she is deeply distressed by what the proposed cuts would mean for her program.
"If the soft money is taken away, which is what they're asking to do - the 100 percent cuts for us - that takes away our ability to do everything else except open our doors," Foster said. "We would not be able to provide any programming. We would not be able to provide any scholarships. We would not be able to provide any work study. We would not be able to provide anything. We would be able to open our doors - possibly provide paper for copying like we do now - and that's about it."
Foster said the proposed budget cut would prevent the AASS program from fulfilling its mission to support black students on campus.
"Right now, we are 2 to 4 percent of the population on campus," she said. "We have almost 800 black students on campus out of 26,000, so if you took our ability away to service those students that are here, we feel that those numbers would all but disappear. And I think that the black population on campus would really be at a point that it quite possibly could cease to exist, and that would be, I think, catastrophic to the University, for Albuquerque, and New Mexico."
