O'Bannon to make cuts

Indiana lawmakers ended this session of the General Assembly Thursday with no answers for the state's budget shortfall. Facing an unresolved $1.3 billion deficit, Governor Frank O'Bannon will now be forced to begin making cuts in spending beginning this week. Education, the largest chunk of the budget, will not be spared. \nFor IU, the cuts may mean a tuition increase and more administrative slashing.\nLawmakers tried for months to agree on a plan to fix the problems in the state budget. O'Bannon offered a proposal to raise revenue through cigarette and gambling tax increases.\nYet Republicans maintained they would not pass the tax increases O'Bannon wanted during a recession. \nWhen the session ended Thursday at midnight, no compromise had been reached. O'Bannon is now readying his ax.\n"Now that it's all over, the governor is more than disappointed. He is angry," said O'Bannon's press secretary Mary Deiter. \nO'Bannon said from the start of the session in January that he wanted to avoid cutting spending for\neducation. But with the Assembly adjourning empty handed, he is left with little room to maneuver, Deiter said.\n"He had said that if the legislature did not balance the budget, he wouldn't have any choice but to cut education," she said. "The Republicans said, 'fine'."\nJames Tinney, managing editor for the IU office of communications and marketing, said the University was "disappointed" and preparing to adjust to the potential cuts.\n"We thought some sort of solution was necessary not just for higher education but also for the economic future for the state," Tinney said. "We are in the situation of waiting for what the governor announces."\nBut there is still a sliver of hope that something will yet be done. The governor may call a special session to give lawmakers more time to resolve the budget.\nDeiter said it was "likely, but not immediate" that a special session will be convened. The governor wants lawmakers to reach an agreement first, so the special session will not be a waste, she said. \nTrustee Stephen Ferguson said the deficit is so dire that lawmakers cannot afford to not come back in special session, even though reconvening costs taxpayer dollars. \n"There ought to be a special session to address all these issues and this ought to be done in the very near future," he said. "(The deficit) is an extremely difficult situation, and it's going to be very painful."\nNo one wants to do it, Ferguson said, but cuts in education have become nearly unavoidable. Indiana government is already small, and cutting money to prisons and Medicaid is not feasible, he said.\n"These are difficult choices for the governor because he doesn't want to cut education," Ferguson said.\nDeiter made the same point. \n"There's not a lot of fat which makes it enormously difficult," she said. "You can cut prisons and Medicaid only so much."\nTrustee Sue Talbot said the pending cuts in state funding will create touch decisions in the coming months for IU. In budget cuts outlined last year, president Myles Brand made the academics sacrosanct. Talbot said Brand wants to do the same this time around.\n"Going into the session, we knew it was going to be difficult," Talbot said. "We're going to preserve the academic mission at all costs. Of course, that's going to mean sacrifices somewhere else."\nFreshman Will Glass is worried that his parents will pay more in tuition next year as a result of the\ndeficit. \n"It appears as if the budget cuts directed towards higher education will undoubtedly lead to increased tuition costs for students," Glass said.