Provost's reallocation stabilizes MU Libraries budget

The budget deficit is no longer an issue.

By Krystin Arneson

Published Nov. 10, 2009

Due to last year's $850,000 reallocation by Provost Brian Foster, the MU Libraries, which were in bad financial shape last year, has stabilized its budget.

In September 2008, the library system was facing a budget deficit of about $850,000, according to Maneater archives.

"The main difficulty facing all academic institutions right now is that the costs of higher education are escalating, while support form the state and federal government is declining," MU Libraries Director Jim Cogswell said.

This decrease in funding, along with the rising costs of inflation and publication and journal acquisitions, contributed to the budget deficit.

The Library Committee, which is made of various faculty members and Missouri Students Association and Graduate Professional Council representatives, had been watching expenses begin to slowly outpace funding in the past few years. In addition, financing from the university tended to spike and fall unpredictably, which made planning ahead difficult.

"We had some real issues a couple years ago," said Robert Bauer, Library Committee chairman and associate professor of geological sciences.

With input from committee members, Bauer said he sent off what he called a "fairly expensive proposal" to Foster. Although it didn't specify a certain amount of money needed, it did request more funds and emphasized the budget was in dire shape.

Foster was able to reallocate $850,000 by drawing from funds what normally would have been allocated to the deans for use in the university's various colleges.

Bauer said the deans proved to be extremely generous and raised little complaint about having to make due with less.

"Libraries are such a foundation across campus," Bauer said. "A certain amount of credit should be given to the deans for realizing that the libraries are critical."

Some long-term expenses in the library are harder manage. Bauer said the price of books and journals go up at a higher rate — between 7 and 12 percent annually, Cogswell said — than the consumer price index and effectively outpace it. In addition, Bauer said many of the presses are located in the Netherlands and other European countries where the U.S. dollar is very weak — and the publishers realize it.

"To be a little more crass, all the publishers are basically trying to make as much money as they can," Bauer said. "It's not a monopoly, but they have a very strong position in bargaining power."

This combination of inflation, the weak dollar and money-minded publishers means the libraries must pay more each year for journals, even if they're not actually acquiring more subscriptions, Bauer said.

According to the libraries' expenditure spreadsheet, the cost of journal acquisitions in fiscal year 2007 was about $5.1 million, but that figure increased to about $5.8 million by fiscal year 2009. Most of the provost's bailout went to making up the deficit from this steep increase, with some left over to anticipate any shortfall in this year's budget.

Cogswell said the money from the provost and an additional $240,000 in continuing funding for fiscal year 2010 with a 5 percent adjustment for inflation starting the next year, is helping the libraries plan ahead.

The Library Committee meetings, once occupied with talk of budgets and finances, now focus on less alarming matters, said Judith Mabary, a new committee member and associate professor of music history.

With the budget no longer a topic of committee meetings, Bauer said libraries are no longer operating a deficit budget.

"While it was a fairly critical issue a few years ago, it's been stabilized," Bauer said.