The fallout from the protests of last fall are having a wide reaching impact.

The Columbia Daily Tribune reports.

50 jobs eliminated as University of Missouri cuts hit cleaning, maintenance operations

The University of Missouri will be shaggier and dirtier and faculty will be responsible for taking their own trash to dumpsters under the plan for cutting 50 jobs in campus operations detailed in an email memo sent Friday by Vice Chancellor Gary Ward.

Landscaping operations will be cut back so sidewalk edges are trimmed no more than twice a year and only in the most visible locations, Ward wrote. After Saturday football games, the debris left by tailgaters will not be picked up until Monday, he wrote.

Custodial staff no longer will clean or remove trash or recyclables from offices, Ward wrote.

“This frees up custodians to assist with recycling, which, previously, has been a volunteer effort,” Ward wrote.

The plan to save $5.47 million in the MU Operations division that employs 842 people exempts the MU Police Department and MU Environmental Health and Safety. Ward warned it likely means slower response time for maintenance issues, less overtime and slower snow removal.

In the email, Ward warned that “we will be unable to sustain the level of service for which you have become accustomed. I do not anticipate that changes beginning July 1, 2016, will inhibit the academic mission at Mizzou, nor is it my intention for that to ever happen.”

Ward’s email is his response to a March 9 directive for a 5 percent cut to general fund budgets from interim Chancellor Hank Foley. The directive imposed a hiring freeze and warned there would be no salary increases.

The Columbia campus is trying to cover $22 million of an expected $32.5 million shortfall because of declining enrollment and new commitments such as the new Division of Inclusion, Diversity and Equity, spokesman Christian Basi said. The cuts do not take into account possible state budget reductions or increases.

Of the 50 positions in operations to be cut, 21.75 currently are vacant and will not be filled, and many others are in auxiliary departments such as campus catering or facilities, Basi said. Many are held by students, he said.

An additional 10.5 full-time equivalent positions will be eliminated June 30, and five employees already have received notice they will be laid off, Basi said.


 
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