Financial Boost for Special Projects
There were good signs for the System's financial picture in 1987. That spring, the legislature fully funded the "Formula for Excellence" for the second straight year. Towards the end of the year, University System institutions reported receiving a record $228 million in research grants and contracts, and the regents sent the governor a $1 billion budget request for FY 1989 that included a unique new element called the Special Funding Initiative (SFI). The board crafted a five-year, "quality-improvement" package to provide support outside of the formula to a number of long-range System initiatives. These special projects and programs included:
- expanding nursing/health-care programs;
- increasing access to baccalaureate programs in under-served areas of the state through extension programs;
- expanding the base for pre-engineering education through the new Regents Engineering Transfer Program;
- creating centers for arts, research, teacher education and foreign language/culture;
- improving instruction and research at UGA, Georgia State and the Medical College of Georgia
- reducing the student/faculty ratio at Georgia Tech; and
- providing incentive for System institutions to secure matching funds for equipment for research and instruction (funding to be awarded on a competitive basis).
"We're finally putting our dreams and plans on paper," remarked Board Chair Jackie Ward. Regent John Henry Anderson, chair of the board's Committee on Finance and Business, called the Special Funding Initiative "probably the most exciting thing I've seen since sitting in this chair all these years."
The board asked for $31 million to fund the first "installment" of the package. Alas, state lawmakers allotted the SFI only $10 million for FY 1989. Undaunted, the regents asked for $32 million in their FY 1990 budget proposal. This time, the SFI was funded at $14 million, so the board asked for $32 million again in the FY 1991 budget request. But the state was entrenched in a recession, and the System was headed for a serious financial crisis. Only $4.5 million was appropriated for the SFI in that budget.