Fresno State facing $4.2 million in permanent cuts in wake of proposed California budget

Fresno State students, faculty and staff returned to campus for the spring semester Thursday amid a sobering financial outlook — including $4.2 million in cuts that will have to be addressed in the wake of a proposed $375 million reduction in state funding that will impact the 23-campus California State University system.

University president Saúl Jiménez-Sandoval, who made the announcement in a campus-wide email, said Fresno State’s share of the proposed reduction is estimated to be around $19 million.

Fresno State is planning for the cuts by drawing $13.8 million from Benefit and Compensation one-time reserves to temporarily reduce the loss of permanent funds to campus. It also will allocate an additional $1 million from one-time carryforward funds to Academic Affairs. Fresno State already had imposed a hiring freeze on non-essential positions, and restricted non-essential purchases and travel to cut expenses.

But that still leaves $4.2 million in permanent cuts to address.

And, as the Fresno State president noted in his email to campus, dipping into one-time reserves is only a short-term solution.

In a statement to The Fresno Bee, Jiménez-Sandoval said: “Each division is currently working on a budget reduction plan to address the remainder of the $4.2 million, with the primary goal of allowing us to preserve as much of our campus operations, staff, and faculty as possible for the upcoming fiscal year. An additional $1 million is being allocated to Academic Affairs, to preserve the teaching mission that is critical to our university.

“Academic Affairs currently does not have plans for layoffs. The measures we have taken and will take to mitigate the budget cuts include eliminating or delaying faculty, advisor and staff hires. With the reduction in 2024-25 and the projected reduction in 2025-2026, we would have 30 to 40 fewer tenure/tenure track faculty, 50 to 60 fewer lecturers, eliminating up to 500 course sections.”

The university has increased class sizes to accommodate students from lost sections so that instruction and access to classes are not significantly impacted. Other budget impacts, Jiménez-Sandoval said, include eliminating faculty professional development, portions of faculty assigned time and tuition waivers for graduate students.

It is expected to have a update in the spring as the budget proposed by Gov. Gavin Newsom is finalized.

The university in 2024-25 was able to balance its budget despite a $10 million shortfall in funding, the CSU navigating through a $218 million budget cut.

“While this approach allows us to preserve as much of our campus operations, staff, and faculty as possible for the upcoming fiscal year, it is not a sustainable strategy as the funds are one-time, and not recurring,” Jiménez-Sandoval said, in the campus email. “If these budget challenges persist, we will not be able to rely on the $14.8 million one-time reserves to offset future permanent shortfalls.

“Cuts have deep consequences, and in our mission of transforming lives, those consequences are deeply human. They affect our employees, communities, industries relying on a diverse workforce, the state’s economy, and most of all, the students and families we serve — paid for in time, expense, and dreams deferred.”

This story was originally published January 16, 2025 at 10:06 AM.