http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations Randy Hodgins blogs from Olympia Tue, 27 Oct 2009 18:52:47 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I recently received a chart from the Council of President's (COP) office that kind of left me speechless. No matter how close you are to budget issues, etc. it's important every now and then to take a look at the bigger picture. The problem in this case, is that the bigger picture is pretty ... http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/was-it-something-we-said/ It's two weeks to election day, I've got way too many dead leaves on my lawn and it's cold at night. Must be the beginning of another budget season in Olympia. While the Governor's supplemental budget is not due until the middle of December, given the state's looming budget shortfall (estimate ... http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/budget-cuts-mach-6-0-no-easy-choices-left/ Rep. Reuven Carlyle has now posted two extremely thought provoking posts on his blog about the future of higher education in the state -- what's wrong, what needs to change, and how to make things better. Anyone who cares about higher education funding and our relationship with state government should ... http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/higher-education-thoughts-from-rep-carlyle/ The United Faculty of Washington which represents faculty at the four-year regional universities has recently debuted a new higher education blog. The most recent post discusses why Washington citizens are at a disadvantage in the competition for the state's best jobs. http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/new-higher-ed-blog-debuts/ Governor Gregoire has chosen a replacement for Cindy Zehnder who announced in August her plans to step down as chief of staff in the Governor's office.  Jay Manning, who has been serving as director of the Department of Ecology will replace Zehnder effective October 19. Manning has lead the Department of ... http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/jay-manning-tapped-as-new-governors-chief-of-staff/ During legislative debate on tuition increases this past session, the state's public baccalaureate system took some pointed criticism from many corners about not being efficient or effective enough with state taxpayer dollars or student tuition dollars.   At the time, we didn't have enough concrete information from a national comparative perspective to prove ... http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/in-defense-of-the-four-year-system/ Students, faculty and staff at the University of California's 10 campuses aren't taking their significant budget cuts lying down. Today, rallies and job actions are planned throughout the state to protest legislative budget cuts, furloughts and tuition increases. Here's the story from today's The New York Times. http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/california-higher-education-makes-some-noise/ The state economic and revenue forecast council met in Olympia this morning to adopt the most recent forecast of state general fund revenues.  The new forecast shows projected tax collections down $238 million for the remainder of the 2009-11 biennium. Dr. Arun Raha, the state's chief forecaster, indicated that the state's economy ... http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/state-revenue-forecast-declines-again-but-the-recession-may-be-over/ I don't know about you but I'm still not quite fully adjusted to the fact that our primary election was held in mid-August.  I'm so conditioned to thinking about mid to late September as primary season, which of course starts me thinking about the upcoming November election. This is an off-year ... http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/fall-ballot-measure-update/ Rep. Reuven Carlyle just completed his first legislative session as a representative from the 36th legislative district in Seattle (Queen Anne, Magnolia, etc.).  He serves on the House Higher Education committee and is a strong supporter of all sectors of education.  Here's a recent post from his blog that expreses his ... http://www.washington.edu/externalaffairs/staterelations/rep-carlyle-blogs-on-uw-past-present-and-future-in-olympia/