photo credit: Noah Abrams
Protests at Sonoma State University

Sonoma State University is facing a budget crisis, with proposed cuts to academic programs and faculty positions, as well as the elimination of the university’s athletics program.

But a group of faculty, students, and community members are pushing back with a plan they say could save the university. Here's Elaine Newman, a mathematics and statistics professor at Sonoma State:

"Fuse stands for Forever United for Sonoma Excellence, and it's a coalition of faculty and students and members of the community that are all focused on saving Sonoma State. This is part of a Save our Sonoma State campaign," said Newman.

She's also interim chapter president of the faculty union, and says the university's budget crisis is a manufactured one.

"We are a giant system," said Newman. "We have billions of dollars in reserves. The state legislature asked the CSU to use some of its reserves to cover the budget of the campuses during this time when the state couldn't fund the CSU as well as it had been. The CSU has chosen not to do that."

The FUSE group thinks the university's current size is appropriate, Newman says, and that the solution to the budget crisis lies in a more horizontal governance structure.

"We think that the hierarchical structure on campus is too vertical, that that has been the change since the late 90s. So we have the same number of students, same number of faculty. Students are paying more than ever for their student fees. So the problem is not the faculty, the problem is not the students. And instead, maybe we should go back to a more academic-driven mission for the university. We should prioritize academic excellence, and this is not the way to do that," Newman said.

The Fuse plan includes electing academic leaders to replace administrative positions.

“So we're proposing that that that faculty leaders would be elected for positions," Newman explained. "They would serve, say, a 3 to 5 year term. The position then, would not pay excessively. We would cap those salaries for that work. And this would save the $23 million dollars that the university has said we have to cut." 

Newman says that cuts proposed by CSU could cause irreparable damage to the university.

“When you cut programs that students want to be a part of, there's less reason for them to be here. So we are worried that the cure, the quote unquote cure for our budget problem is actually worse than the problem itself. We learned today at a budget meeting on campus that the anticipated loss of enrollment is $1 million more than the amount of money that the Chancellor’s Office had asked Sonoma State to reallocate to other larger campuses. So they're already anticipating in their modeling a huge enrollment decline, which we worry will lead to further cuts in instruction, which we worry will lead to further decline in student enrollment," said Newman."

The FUSE group says it has gathered signatures on a petition and is hoping to gain more support from the community.

"Many of the supporters are people who are emeritus faculty. They are former administrators at Sonoma State. It's a broad coalition of faculty and community members and students," Newman said.

The group says they believe their plan is a viable alternative to the proposed cuts currently on the table.

State legislators are meeting on the SSU campus Friday, February 21st to discuss the budget crisis.

KRCB News will be at that meeting and continue to provide coverage on this developing story.