The University of Connecticut is looking at possible measures to address a $134 million budget deficit for fiscal year 2026, including reducing staff, restricting travel, events and activities, and using one-time reserves.
Officials are saying the number is the combined deficit across both UConn and UConn Health after the $55.5 billion state budget netted millions less for the university. This coupled with reductions in federal support for research has left the university looking for ways to reduce spending.
UConn President Radenka Maric said in an email to the UConn community Monday that the university will be able to utilize a portion of one-time funds to address the shortfall, as well as tuition and auxiliary revenue dollars and a shift in capital spending.
“It should be noted that as the fiscal year progresses, OPM may elect to allocate additional cuts to our appropriations to balance the state budget,” she said.
She said the university would also review “non-permanent and temporary employees as an initial step in reducing the size of our workforce; will review and potentially pause all current searches not in the offer stage; restrict more hiring; and review overtime and compensatory time.”
Further, Maric said the university would also restrict employee travel, events and other activities and review service contracts.
In an earlier message to the community, Maric said closing the deficit will “create significant challenges and we will have to utilize multiple strategies to accomplish this, many of them detrimental to our aspirations, operations and mission.”
Stephanie Reitz, spokesperson for UConn, said the Board of Trustees will review the FY 2026 budget proposal including “potential options to mitigate the (funding) gap,” at its meeting on Wednesday.
The UConn chapter of the American Association of University Professors has shared concerns about potential layoffs in future years and increases in tuition and larger class sizes.
Discrepancies on funding
Another dynamic complicating the budget is difference of opinion between Gov. Ned Lamont and the university over funding allocations.
In an email to the Courant, the governor’s office said the state budget recently passed by the legislature and signed by the governor increased funding for UConn and UConn Health’s block grants by more than 20% in fiscal year 2026.
“Previous UConn budget allocations included non-recurring funds that higher education received in fiscal year 2025, including $91 million in one-time allocations of state surplus and $268 million in federal ARPA funds, which are not state funds,” the governor’s office said.
The governor’s office added that Lamont was clear at the end of the legislative session that surplus and ARPA funds are one-time and there should be no expectations that they will continue in the future.
The governor’s office said due to those ARPA funds, UConn had $468 million in unrestricted reserves as of June 30, 2024.
“These funds now enable UConn to be on a strong glide path, by using such reserves, to make any changes to deal with structural financial challenges,” the governor’s office said.
But Maric said that “using these funds to close short-term deficits will create new financial problems that didn’t exist previously and new unmet needs throughout the institution.
“And if these one-time funds become exhausted, they do not automatically replenish and structural deficits remain,” she said in the email to the UConn community. “Despite the very real challenges and hardships this will cause, our current financial picture does not leave us with a reasonable alternative.”
The state budget provided $113 million less for UConn and UConn Health than was approved in fiscal year 2025.
The state allocated $268.2 million in the first year and $253.5 million in the second year to UConn. State support accounts for 15% of UConn’s budget compared to 20% last year.
House Speaker Matt Ritter, D-Hartford, said he increasingly finds himself isolated in advocating for additional funding for higher education.
“In the caucus room when we talk about funding and priorities, there is not a sense that higher education is grossly underfunded,” he said. “I think the vast majority of the legislature agrees with the Connecticut Office of Policy and Management and the governor.”
Ritter said those who were advocating for more money for higher education were more on the isolated side in the legislature.
“It is not like I got 101 other Democrats in my office saying that you have to do better by higher ed,” he said. “That did not happen.”
He said UConn is popular and its national reputation is strong.
“But at the same time, you definitely have an administration that has been consistent over the last seven years that they feel that higher ed is overfunded,” he said. “That may be how people perceive it now. It is hard for legislators, at least in my mind, as someone who is very close to UConn’s administration. I sometimes am at a loss. They claim a number. The administration says it is completely false. There are such big discrepancies in what is being asked for and what the administration is saying they need. I have to admit, short of me auditing the books, it is hard for me to make that call sometimes.”
Ritter said there is a “strong, passionate disagreement about the level of funding UConn needs from the state.
“We are not operating under a common set of facts anymore,” he said. “That is problematic. We need to get people back on the same planet.”
Class sizes
Chris Vials, professor of English and president of the UConn chapter of the American Association of University Professors, said his biggest concern is layoffs, higher tuition and larger class sizes over time.
Vials said he is concerned that this will result in a reduced quality of education for everyone.
Andrea Celli, associate professor of Italian and Mediterranean studies, said morale at the university has declined over the years with cuts that have included programs and classes and impacted graduate programs.
He said class sizes have also increased, which has not helped students.
“Students will have less opportunities to be exposed to more advanced levels of instruction and of course less of an ability for an instructor to create direct relationships with individual students,” he said.
He added that UConn currently does not have money to support graduate students in extracurricular activities this summer.
Further, he is most concerned that careers in science and highly trained careers will be more limited in the future.
Michael Enright, spokesman for the university, said UConn has closed or consolidated a small number of academic programs, but that was in the course of normal academic housekeeping based on low enrollments, not in reaction to the upcoming budget.
“Every unit, both academic and non-academic, has had budget reductions this past year as UConn has worked to manage its overall budget,” he said.
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