University Planning and Resources Council

Note: Faculty Senate approved a restructuring of the University Planning and Resources Council at the Nov. 27, 2023 meeting.

Restructuring UPRC

Motion: Restructure the Faculty Senate University Planning and Resource Council (UPRC) by replacing it with two new positions on the Faculty Senate Executive Council, the “Faculty Senate University Budget Representative” and “Faculty Senate University Budget Deputy Representative.”   We propose that the UPRC be restructured by replacing the committee with two permanent positions on the Faculty Senate Executive Committee, titled the “Faculty Senate University Budget Representative” and “Faculty Senate University Budget Deputy Representative.” The central work of these two positions will be advocacy, transparency, and communication as they represent budget-related faculty perspectives, questions, and concerns to the administration, and report back to the faculty. Both positions will be a 1-year term. And the University Budget Deputy Representative will step into the position of University Budget Representative at the end of their term.

Faculty Senate University Budget Representative Responsibilities

The University Budget Representative will be a non-voting member of the Faculty Senate Executive Council and will attend meetings of both the Faculty Senate Executive Council and the Faculty Senate. They will offer quarterly updates to the Senate regarding the budget. They will be a voting member of the University Budget Committee. They will conduct regular meetings with the Vice President for Business and Financial Affairs and the Provost. In addition, the University Budget Representative will work regularly with the chairs of the College Governance Committees. They will also moderate and maintain a web page and blog on the Faculty Senate website, where faculty can pose questions and offer feedback, and where they can offer updates and information about the budget.

Faculty Senate University Budget Deputy Representative

The primary responsibility of the University Budget Deputy Representative is to support the work of the University Budget Representative and to familiarize themselves with the university budget and budget operations. They will be a non-voting member of the Faculty Senate Executive Council and will attend meetings of both the Faculty Senate Executive Council and the Faculty Senate. They will be a voting member of the University Budget Committee.

Rationale

For more than a decade, the UPRC has been largely ineffective. Though the bylaws offer an array of charges, most of those have been overlooked, and it has spent the bulk of its time offering recommendations to the administration regarding external decision packages and internal budget proposals. UPRC has never been able to effectively integrate its recommendations into the budget process of the University. Its recommendations have often been too late to have any effect and rarely seem to have had any impact on Western’s actual budget requests. All of the work of the UPRC has always been merely advisory. Over the past several years, UPRC has undergone various kinds of revisions, all in the service of making it more effective. None have been very successful.   In addition, over the past three years, the administration has been revising the budget proposal process. Currently, decision packages no longer go through a committee process, and the internal budget proposal process is on hold, with the expectation that this process will be relocated within colleges. (Thus, the Budget Representative will work with the College Governance Committees, on budget related matters.) Thus, the central work of UPRC no longer exists. In addition, the administration has created the University Budget Committee, which performs work similar to the UPRC, offering recommendations to the Cabinet. This University Budget Committee, chaired by the Provost and the VP for Business and Financial Affairs, makes much of the work of UPRC not merely ineffective but redundant.

Endorsed by past UPRC members

• Nicholas Wonder
• Hart Hodges
• Robert Mitchell
• Cynthia Camlin
• Craig Moyers
• Jennifer Thistle
• Kristin Denham
• Ying Li
• Lindsay Foreman-Murray
• Allison Giffen
• Brandon Dupont