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Vol. LXXX, No. I
Ann Arbor, Michigan-Wednesday, August 27, 1969
Six Pages
ADMINISTRATION
. . .
Won-support'eads
By MARTIN HIRSCHMAN
Summer Supplement Editor
WITH SUBSTANTIAL annual tuition increases and an
ever-tightening squeeze on expenditures, the Univer-
sity is facing unprecedented financial problems.
Over the last few years, there has been a slow decline
in the nation-wide rating of faculty salaries at the Uni-
versity. But with a national ranking of 24, the University ,
remains in strong competition with other leading schools
for the nation's top academicians.
To maintain the high level of faculty salaries, how-
ever, the University has been forced to tighten up on al-
most all non-salary expenditures.
For example, there has been a steady increase in thek-
average class size as growth of the faculty has failed to
keep pace with enrollment. Virtually all innovative pro-
grams have been postponed-and where they have been
implemented it has often been at the cost of eliminating
an existing program. Secretarial assistance for the aca-
demic staff is minimal and there is even a shortage of
office supplies like paper and rubber bands. The list of
budgetary cutbacks seems endless.
And if these financial problems continue for a few more
years, the University may eventually run out of items to
cut. Then faculty salaries might slacken, with a migration
of professors to more affluent schools a distinct possibility. .
Such a migration has yet to begin.
IN ESSENCE, the University's fiscal problems are simply a.4
reflection of the financial dilemma faced by the State
Legislature - the University's most important source of
funds.
With demands for more state support rising rapidly on
all fronts, the Legislature has consistently declined to give
the University more than minimal increases in appropria-~Vce Presi
tions. In fact, these increases have not even kept pace with
inflation. In real purchasing power state appropriations
over the last 10 years have declined from $800 per student
to $550
Last year, the University requested a state appropria-
tion of $75.8 million. But by the time the higher education
appropriations bill had weaved its way through the cata-
combs of backroom politics which is the state capital, there
was only $63.3 million for the University's general operat-
ing budget.
The result was a $240 tuition increase for out-of-state
students, a significant increase for in-staters and further
cutbacks of the genre which have followed from the Uni-
versity's now three-year-old austerity budget.
As this supplement goes to press this summer, the
Legislature is again haggling over the size of the Univer- ,
sity's appropriation. Already Gov. William Milliken has
slashed the University's request from $75.9 million to $67.2
million.
AND, IN MICHIGAN politics at least, the governor never
gets in the last word. Over the past few years the
Legislature has consistently underbid the governor in what
appears to be the state government's never-ending struggle
to obtain, in the words of Vice President for State Relations
and Planning Arthur Ross, "non-support" for the Univer-
sity. ^" " it
On the other side of the fence, the deans of the Uni-
versity's 18 schools and colleges and the directors of its
numerous divisions keep pleading for more funds. The
social work school wants to hire more faculty members to
offset increases in class size. The engineering school wants
money to hire professors in a new, rapidly developing field.
See 'NON-SUPPORT,' Page 2 Vice President
to austerity
dent Allan Smith: The man in the middle
President Robben Fleming: Quieting the campus, collecting support
The lemg machine
By STEVE NISSEN
City Editor
BESPECTACLED and gray-haired father
figure, Robben Fleming gives the impression
he. really wants students to like him. Student
leaders find it easier to get an appointment with
him than with most faculty members-and once
inside his modest office they are impressed by
the way he relaxes cross-lu.ged on his couch
while intently soaking up their questions and
comments
Eighteen months ago, when Fleming was ap-
pointed president, it was hoped his softspoken
manner and tolerant attitude would provide an
effective buffer for the frictional forces which
were seriously threatening the University.
Fleming already had gained a nationwide rep-
utation for adept and shrewd dealings with stu-
dents. When he was chancellor of the Madison
campus of the University of Wisconsin, for ex-
ample, he had police arrest a group of demon-
strating students and then wrote a personal
check to bail them out.
And the choice of Fleming to succeed Presi-
dent Harlan Hatcher, who retired in 1967. ap-
pears to be paying off. Despite the presence of
all the factors which have caused other cam-
puses to explode, Ann Arbor has been extremely
calm.
BUT DESPITE this calm, all is not well in
Babylon. And Fleming, despite his apparent
success and confidence, is embroiled in a dan-
gerous battle of wits, power, and money with
students, faculty members, the State Legislature.
alumni and even the Regents.
Fleming is the first to admit the precarious-
ness of his position. Last May, he told Rep.
Edith Green's committee, which was holding
hearings on student unrest, that while the Uni-
versity has been "spared" major disruption, "we
are under no illusions whatever that we are im-
imune from the tragic events that have taken
place on other campuses."
, troag number of students and faculty mem-
bers are becoming dissatisfied with Fleming's
habit of playing both ends against the middle-
Take, for exaimple, a statement made last Jan-
uary, on the eve of the arrests for indecent ex-
posure of the entire cast of the play "Dionysus
in 69," which was being produced on campus at
the invitation of the University Activities Center.
"The human body is hardly obscene," Fleming
said, "Thus nudity in and of itself is difficult to
describe as obscene."
But he added "The University is not a sanctu-
ary, the law applies on campus as well as in the
community. It is unfair of us to criticize the
local prosecutor and police because of a law
enforcement problem they did not seek."
IN ONE STATEMENT, Fleming has mollified
the civil libertarians by defending nudity on
stage, the State Legislature by denying that the
University is a sanctuary where "anything goes,"
and local police officials by defending their
right to uphold "law and order."
Fleming's refusal to take a concrete stand on
some issues has gathered criticism from faculty
and many students. Explains one young profes-
sor, "You get the feeling Fleming has no real
ideology of his own. He simply listens to the
various pressure groups in the University and
then moves in such a way as to create the mini-
mum of conflict."
The result has been peace, and with it, the
time to make slow but steady changes in the
University. But a good deal of Fleming's liberal-
ism is illusory
KEY FACTOR in the creation of this illusion
was the obstinacy and insensitivity of the
administration during the Hatcher years. Hatch-
er's aloofness and rigidity gave Fleming a unique
opportunity to win credits with the students by
conceding relatively minor points of contention
.-sore points which could have been eliminated
years ago without any loss to the administration.
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..Daily-Jay Cassidy
Arthur Ross: Seeking less 'non-support' for 'U'
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