REGENTS ENACT PAY INCREASES AS `TOP PRIORITY'

The Board of Regents at Southeast Missouri State University Thursday approved a nearly $50 million operating budget for the institution.

The fiscal plan includes pay raises for faculty and staff.

The regents approved a $49.87 million budget for the 1993 fiscal year, with the largest share of that $36.3 million going for salaries and benefits for the institution's approximately 950 employees.

That's an increase of about $1.7 million over personnel costs for the current fiscal year, university officials said.

"Our top priority was to give increases to faculty and staff," the university's president, Kala Stroup, said.

University employees received no general pay raise last year because of state funding problems.

But under the budget approved for the coming fiscal year, which begins July 1, faculty on average will see a 5.8 percent pay hike; clerical, technical, service, crafts, administrative and professional staff a 4.1 percent pay hike; and executive staff, 4 percent. The executive staff consists of the president, vice presidents and the deans.

The pay raises include a merit or performance-based component for each employee group, plus a 3 percent across-the-board pay hike for all employee groups except the executive staff.

Increases for the executive staff are based solely on performance evaluations, university officials said.

Of the approximately 400 faculty members, 245 will receive merit pay this year, Stroup said.

The salary hikes also included pay increases for the various faculty ranks, from full professor to instructor.

With everything combined, pay raises for faculty members individually range from 3 percent to 10 percent, Stroup told the regents.

With the pay hikes, university officials said, the average faculty salary will be $39,146, up from $37,000 this year.

The average salary for administrative and professional staff will increase from $28,400 to $29,564. There are approximately 140 professional and administrative staff members.

Clerical, technical and service (CTS) employees will see their average salary climb from $13,800 to $14,366. There are 244 CTS employees.

Carl Ben Bidewell of Poplar Bluff, regents president, said after the meeting that it was important to include pay hikes in the budget.

"Like the old saying goes, if the cook isn't happy, nobody's happy and our faculty and employees are cooking for the university," said Bidewell.

He maintained the state should include enough funding annually to at least give employees a cost-of-living increase.

Of the average salary for faculty now, Bidewell said, "I think it is a good salary."

But he said a $39,000 salary now is probably comparable to a $20,000 salary 15 to 20 years ago, when inflation is considered.

The operating budget assumes Gov. John Ashcroft will withhold 5 percent of the university's state appropriation, leaving the institution with $29.84 million in state funding.

But Ken Dobbins, vice president for finance and administration at Southeast, acknowledged that it's likely Ashcroft will withhold only the usual 3 percent.

That would mean a state appropriation of $30.46 million for general operations at Southeast, or about $628,000 more than has been budgeted by the university.

Dobbins said the additional funds would likely be placed in the university's contingency fund and also used to reduce the university's undesignated fund deficit, which has totaled more than $500,000.

The budget, as approved by the regents, allocates $250,000 to reduce the fund deficit. With additional state money, the deficit could be reduced further, he said.

"We really should have a plus there, instead of a deficit," he pointed out.

"We only have $130,000 in reserve for contingencies," Dobbins said following the meeting. "It's not sufficient to fund contingencies in an institution this size."

In addition, he said, the university's health insurance costs have not yet been finalized.

Stroup told the regents, "You have before you a very tight budget.

"Nobody is totally happy. Everybody compromised," she added.

"I don't think anybody is getting 100 percent of what they wanted, but that is the way of the world," said Regent Mark Pelts of Kennett.

The regents praised the work of the Budget Review Committee in putting together the budget package.