Hope most of you saw the story’s in the papers yesterday about the Governor’s proposals to improve campus safety at the state’s universities and colleges. The UW had requested a total of $5.3 million for various campus safety initiatives in our 2008 supplemental budget request. This included:
- $4.5 million one-time funding for a mass notification system for many of the oldest buildings on campus
- $195,000 one-time funding for an outdoor public address system
- $100,000 one-time funding for a community alert system
- $405,000 ongoing funding for the Violence Prevention and Response Program
- $112,000 ongoing for the Students of Concern Program
- $50,000 ongoing costs for support of the mass notification system
In her announcement on Tuesday (which was made in Parrington Hall), the Governor made it clear her budget will include ALL the one-time funding components requested by the University but deferred consideration of the ongoing requests until the 2009-11 biennial budget.
Here is a link to the official campus safety annoucement from the Governor’s office.
Obviously, a major priority for my office is to insure the legislature supports the Governor’s one-time recommendations while persuading House and Senate fiscal and higher education committee members to support the ongoing funding components.
The Governor will release her entire 2008 supplemental budget recommendations next Tuesday December 18.