Letters to the Editor: CSU’s bleak budget outlook comes with a bloated administration

To the editor: Nowhere in The Times’ otherwise good report on the proposed funding cuts to the California State University system is there any mention of the number of recently added administrators or their salaries.

Many cuts will be made to faculty who actually teach subjects. How many vice presidents, assistant or associate deans and assistant or associate provosts teach classes? Very few.

The chancellor’s base salary is nearly $800,000 (she receives more in housing allowances and deferred compensation). The base salaries of the 23 campus presidents range from around $300,000 to nearly $600,000 each. CSU cannot function without faculty, but I always thought it could do perfectly well without most of what has become a bloated administration.

Margo Kasdan, Seal Beach

The writer is a professor emerita at San Francisco State University.

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To the editor: I’m horrified that Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration continues to propose devastating cuts to CSU. Students will be unable to complete necessary coursework, talented faculty will be laid off, potential students will turn to other colleges, and dedicated staff will be let go.

This is both unnecessary and foolish — unnecessary because the state has $17 billion more in revenue than planned that could offset these cuts, and foolish because education is one of the few state services that generates revenue over time. Educated workers pay more in income taxes, and for every dollar a state spends on education, it collects two dollars in taxes.

Let’s hope Newsom sees the light and reverses course on this misguided proposal.

Charles Delgadillo, Corona