Action Alert!

UGA – College of Agriculture 
 Faced with ‘Mission Devastating’ Budget CUTS

Proposal Closes Four (4) Ag Research Stations
Cuts ½ of All County Extension Offices and Personnel
Eliminates the Georgia 4-H Club Program
Closes All 4-H Club Camps, including Rock Eagle
Plus more cuts . . .    

During a joint session of the Georgia House and Senate Higher Education Appropriation subcommittees on February 24, the Chancellor of the Board of Regents was instructed to develop a plan to reduce the Regent’s budget by an additional $300 million for fiscal year 2011.  This cut would be in addition to $265 million already proposed to be cut in the Governor’s 2011 budget.
 
The University of Georgia’s share of the $300 million cut would be $58.9 million, or 12.8% of UGA’s state budget.  Each Board of Regent Institution (including UGA) was asked to prepare a plan as to how they would meet this cut.  With no input from the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences the University of Georgia identified the cuts/reductions and eliminations they would propose to the Regents.   
 
On Monday March 1, 2010 the Board of Regents released their plan to meet the $300 million cut.  It is devastating to the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.
 
As noted above in the headlines, included in the UGA plan were drastic cuts for the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, particularly in the Extension budget.  The proposal includes $11.66 million in cuts to Cooperative Extension or 33.3% of Extension’s state budget.  When you include cuts already sustained by Extension since 2008 this would amount to a 51.45% cut in Extension’s state budget. The Extension budget makes up 7.6% of UGA’s state budget, but the plan would require Extension to absorb 20% of UGA’s budget cut. 
 
The proposed plan also includes $816 thousand in cuts to the CAES research budget or 1.96% of their budget. The total cumulative budget reduction for Research since 2008 would be 20.43%.
 
A detailed list of the cuts that the Board of Regents are proposing for the entire University System can be accessed on the Regents website by clicking here. 
 
The proposed cuts would be devastating to the land grant mission of the University of Georgia.  The state is in a severe budget crisis but it is unfair to ask the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences to take a bigger hit than other Colleges.  The proposed cuts are unreasonable and not in the best interest of the University or the citizens of Georgia.  
 
CALL TO ACTION: 
 
The fruit and vegetable industry needs you to contact your local state representative or senator.  They need to hear from all of our growers and industry suppliers as to how devastating these cuts would be to our industry, our communities and our citizens. Click here for a number of talking points that you can use to discuss this situation with your representatives.  
 
The representatives on the Appropriations Committees have to approve the Regents budget, and all of our representatives have to VOTE on the budget.  In case you do not know who your representative is here is a link to the House and the Senate members http://www.legis.state.ga.us/.
 

 If you depend on:
….. your local county extension service personnel,
….. our UGA researchers for the latest in crop production information,
….. the Georgia 4-H program to work with our youth,
….. or other resource information from the college
. . . . .help us STOP the cuts.  The College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences will do their share in budget cuts but they should not have to bear the burden for other colleges at UGA.     

PLEASE HELP!!
DO NOT SIT BACK AND ASSUME SOMEONE ELSE WILL MAKE THE CALLS -
 
PLEASE CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVE TODAY!!!
 

For more information or questions please call the GFVGA office at 1-877-99GFVGA.