brass

Enclosed are exerpts from an interview
with Tom Hudson, Deal of Instruction, on
matters of immediate concern to everyone
at the school. This issue will deal with mat-
ters of Finance. A complete copy of the text
of the Dean’s comments is on file in the
newspaper office in the cafeteria for anyone
to read.

THE BUDGET;

“We are still trying to find ways to
balance this year’s budget. We still have
outstanding deficiencies and those people
who are responsible for administering the
areas are taking a final look and exercising
their responsibilities to make readjustments.
It is the job of the administration, par-
ticularly the Bursar and Finance depart-
ment to determine how the budget is
managed, balanced etc. . . ., but the way it
is spent is determined by administration,
the various committees of the college which
are all advisory committees; i.e. Dean’s
Committee (divisional chairmen) Student
Services Committee, Programs Advisory
Committee (Senior advisory committee of
the college) and of course the various consti-
tuent committees of the college via the Prin-
cipal and the minutes of the various
meetings reported to the board.”’

As to your Question about the current
situation, we have been in a status quo
situation for about three yars in terms of
money aspects of our budget. Salaries of
course increasing each year (this year
13%), but since 1979 supplies budgets re-
mained the same therefore losing annually
about 13% of their buying power.”’

“In the last four years, quite apart from
the massive capital expenditure, our
operating costs for a year have increased
from $2,000,000 to over $4,000,000.”’

CUTBACKS;

‘I mentioned about the cutback situation
and that this year we are using a great deal
of money which we had in reserve, but once
that money is spent it is spent & so we are
still looking at additional cutbacks. When
the Ministry asked us which courses we
were cutting, we said we are not cutting any
as all are important as integrated art and
design programs. The cutbacks don’t
necessarily reflect the government’s attitude
towards art, it reflects the government’s
response to the current economic situation.
Similar things are happening throughout
the western world so it does seem that most
support is being put to ‘‘vocational oriented
courses’’. However, you can see by the new
building that the provincial government has
been prepared to make a serious investment
for art eduction and has endorsed the design

tacks

developments by changing the name of the
college, which goes towards some kind of
guarantee of future developments when
money becomes more readily available.’’

‘*This year and currently we have so far
reduced a typical $30,000 divisional budget
down to $27,000 and that might not be the
end of it. The situation is similar but less
noticeable in some other areas; i.e.
honoraria for guest lecturers, no direct cut
but we have had to cut some proportion of
the amount spent on travel. So there are
both direct and indirect cuts.”’

“‘By early closing, which we discussed at
the last Dean’s Committee Meeting and
have asked divisions to discuss it and give us
advice, there are a number of possibilities
that are related to the amount of savings;.
e.g. We can save about $800 daily if we
close on the eight statutory public holidays
which happen during the academic year.
This is a very good way of saving only affec-
ting eight separate days of holidays. The
next way we can save a lot of money, in fact
we could save anywhere up to $20,000 in
the year, but cutting more of the weekends.
The reason for this is on a statutory holiday
we are paying security and other people
three times the normal rate, at a weekend
we are paying two times the normal rate.
There seems to be comparatively very little
saving by closing evenings during the
weekdays and that frankly I would not want
to close.”

“Incidentally, of course, we have had
to take a cutback in articulation area; i.e. in
field trips/student travel. We are still
managing to hold on to a little, but certainly
we have to look upon last year’s $26,000 as
being quite incredible and unique under the
circumstances.”’

“At the current time it is going to be dif-
ficult to hold onto the two areas which we
have curricular travel — the major support
for the annual visit of ceramics students to
Mexico and a number of painters/print-
makers to New York.

“‘The concourse Gallery operated last
year with an official expenditure of only
$500 because everybody was doing the
work on a self-help basis’’.

“I am trying to keep a few hundred
dollars for similar purposes this year, but we
will not be able to seriously develop that
currently; i.e. provide audio and film
booths, large scale back projectors, sets of
frames etc. . . ., probably for some years
yet,

“The Charles H. Scott Gallery was
never properly funded by the Ministry and

INTERVIEW:
TOM HUDSON

like everywhere else will have to take some

measure of cuts. We may also have to find

some external funding for it in the future.”’

“On your question related to new

machinery and technology in the school
>

‘“The situation has been deplorable this
year. I had requests from the divisions to a
total of $400,000 for capital equipment.
The full total awarded to us by the Ministry
was $32,000 for the year. I have reduced,
by working out with the relevant committee
a’ system of priorities, that this year we ac-
tually needed approximately $176,000 to
continue the condition of growth.”’

“Don’t forget that this year because of
the equipment obsolescence, deterioration,
etc ..., we had over $100,000 of equip-
ment which should have been replaced,
quite separate from the above capital
statements. We also had round about
$70,000 of obsolescence in last year’s
budget. Again, none of those items were
replaced. The figure for next year will be
even larger.”’

TUITION:

“Fees . . . virtually no increase this year.
In October the Chairman of the Board will
be instituting discussions on the future in-
crease of fees. We have not increased fees
significantly over the last one half dozen
years or so. I think that was a mistake now,
I think it is better to have annual small in-
creases than to have no increase for several
years and then a large increase; however,
there is no intention of massive increases
such as has happened at some colleges and
which has been the subject of rumour here.
The Chairman thought that we should in-
form students about the government cut-
backs and asked Tom Kowall for a lot of in-
formation about colleges’ fee structure in
*various areas. Don’t forget, our fees are still
the second lowest in North America for a
four year college and it costs between
$6,000 and $8,000 per year for students to
be educated in this place.”’

“‘We had discussions about a supply
store, the whole situation was costed out
and we would not find it possible to operate
with fiscal efectiveness; i.e. making enough
money to run the store, pay the manager/
clerk and still be able to provide a better
deal than any existing firms. Another aspect
is that the area originally designated for a
store had to be taken over for the Finance
Department once we got our independance
and were severed from Vancouver Com-
munity College, who previously carried out
so much of the administration.”’

“I don’t want to sort of end by being a
prophet of doom, because I have been in
education a long time and it is generally a
swing and roundabout situation. I think
that probably this is the downswing and we
should look forward by 1982-83 to some
kind of an improvement.”’