Editor,
To President David Schmidly and Regents President Jamie Koch: Thank you for taking it easy on the employees of UNM by offering us the opportunity to take a voluntary furlough. For those of us canny enough to read between the lines, voluntary furloughs equal layoffs if not enough folks volunteer.
Faculty members on nine-month contracts are already furloughed for three months during the summer. Part-time faculty are, of course, part-time and don't have much to furlough. Then there's staff - the least-valued commodity on campus - but there's quite a few of us. The fiscal year 2010 budget hasn't even been decided upon, and you've been telling us that with the measures you've already taken, we'll be OK (wink, wink).
Well, I won't be volunteering anytime soon. On my most meager salary, which hasn't moved up in the first quartile of my pay scale since I was hired three years ago, I now support myself, my spouse (who lost his job at the end of January), my 85-year-old father and my 88-year-old uncle. I'm going to have to sell my truck because I won't be able to make the payments, and I've only got seven more left. I may lose my house, which I've owned for 13 years and have only 12 more years to pay on. I'll be canceling my health insurance because I'm going to need that extra $315 a month. Let's hope my husband or I don't get sick.
Rest easy, Schmidly. Fifteen days of your salary is equal to 69 percent of my annual salary (based upon your total annual compensation with deferred compensation and allowances). I'm sure we won't see David Harris taking advantage of the voluntary furlough. We probably won't see anyone making a six-figure salary doing it, either. We certainly won't see folks like me taking advantage of it, however enticing you make it sound. We rely on our full paycheck.
Koch, I'd like to be one of those staff making the median salary. I could probably sleep better at night. Yes, you've kept your word. You hired all those people you said you would. Did you happen to look at the budget and the economy before you did it? Even after it was abundantly clear there was a problem, you still hired those promised positions. You still raided the accounts of the departments to pay for those salaries. I can't even fathom your statement that you didn't know where your salary or Harris' was paid from. You've been a regular faculty; you knew exactly where your salary came from then. But now you're the president, and you claim you don't know? Either you are particularly insulated by your staff, or you haven't learned to read Banner or Hyperion statements, or you just choose to not understand them. By gosh, you even mandated we brand the University. We've got a brand all right - painted with a scarlet brush - for robbing the University blind. Thanks again for keeping your promises.
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Catherine Osborn
UNM staff
