8:30 – 10:30 a.m., Seymour Union, Room 220
Attendees
Voting Members
Lorraine Acker
Mike Andriatch
Steve Barber
Jennifer Blood
Monica Brasted
Susan Butler
Denise Copelton
Jana Craft
Frances Dearing
Scott Haines
Tim Henry
Tom Hernandez
Sara Kelly
Stephanie Learn
Theresa Martinez
Nautica Queen Murray
James Onley
Heather Raczkowski
Jamie Spiller
Robert Wyant
Non-Voting Members
Thomas Chew
Steve Cook
Eileen Daniel
Keith Davis
Crystal Hallenbeck-McPhall
Ian Harper: Co-Chair
Mike Harrison
Rachael Killion
President Macpherson
Paul Montanaro
Gary Morog
Elliot Weininger: Co-Chair
Melissa Wight
Guests
Summer Reiner
William Ruiz
Bonnie Swoger
Regrets
Voting Members
Kathy Peterson
Elizabeth Thorpe
The meeting was called to order at 8:30 a.m.
Approval of the Minutes
Dr. Weininger asked the committee to review the May 8, 2025, meeting minutes. Dr. Spiller motioned to approve the minutes; Ms. Dearing the motion. Members voted to approve the minutes. Therefore, the minutes were approved.
Announcements
None as this time.
Welcome and New Member Introductions
Dr. Weininger welcomed everyone to a new year. Introductions were conducted for members and guests.
Operating Guidelines and Principles
Members reviewed the committee’s operating guidelines and principles.
Cabinet Response
Members reviewed Cabinet’s response and President Macpherson highlighted items for members. The items were:
- Cabinet’s appreciation for the committee’s work and acceptance of the work.
- Acknowledging the usefulness that the Brockport Foundation presentation provided last year and that the presentation will occur going forward.
- Last year there was a presentation on Student Success Equity Initiative (SSEI) and that work is coming to a close. There will be a closing conference in November that President Macpherson and Dr. Jose Maliekal will be attending.
- Acknowledging the scholarship discussion and the need for more data. However, if you look at our student numbers there has been a positive response to our scholarship program, and we have been able to budget positively for that.
- Acknowledging the work on Investment Funds and Cabinet is accepting those reports. There is a delay in implementing the recommendations because of the slight uncertainty of the state budget. This year the budget was very specific about saying that they might have the opportunity to revisit the budget this year. Given that, we do not want to commit funds too early. We will look again in January about our ability to have Investment Funds.
- Cabinet did put some funding in place for investments in relation to the following items or areas:
- Raising the GA/TA salaries,
- Cybersecurity
- Compliance related training
- Enrollment Management
- Presidential task force
- Asset replacement.
The following questions, answers and discussion points occurred:
- The question was raised regarding Cybersecurity needing extra funding and whether this need will be ongoing. It was stated that when SUNY came forward with the Transformation funds, we used a number of those funds for startups, but we also put a Lab Support Technician on that for Cybersecurity (academic program). Most of the time with transformation dollars, because we know that they are temporary, we do not usually put long term commitments to that. At the time, there was a thought that those transformation funds might be transformed into ongoing funds because sometimes that does happen. What SUNY decided to do with those funds is to move them to the ASAP program. Therefore, we needed to find a way to fund that position.
- The question was raised regarding how the funding for the Cybersecurity Lab Support Technician will be budgeted. It was stated that it has been put in the budget going forward. It was added that we do a 5-year financial model each year where we project out how we think enrollment will be and how our costs will evolve over time. Over the past couple of years, primarily driven by the strong enrollment performance, we can see that the financial position is improving. We are still in a structural deficit which means our revenue does not exceed our expenses, but that gap is narrowing. The enrollment numbers are coming in higher than we projected in our 5-year model. We do not want to rest on our laurels because we are not sure where the State budget could end up. It may be nothing, or it may be something that we need to respond to. If we do, we will face that going forward, but overall, we are in decent shape.
- The question was raised regarding if we create a new academic program and attract new students, shouldn’t that mean we are making more money and offsetting the cost of the program? It was stated that it can, but the important thing is that we are not taking a student who might have been doing one- degree and moving them to another. If they do that, it means we have already recruited them, and they are just moving from one degree to another. It is true that the more programs that we have that are successful and attracting students in as freshmen, which we know Cybersecurity is, that does give us more tuition dollars to then put towards our overall budget. It is always a calculated risk to figure out where to invest in those new programs. Having said that, we also know at a certain point if we have invested in these new programs there may end up being divestment in different programs that are not recruiting in such a big way. For example, we may not replace a retiring professor in one area and may move that line to another area. We had to make a decision on the Cybersecurity position that we did this fall because we didn’t have that space to move a different vacancy at that point, so we added that into the budget.
- The question was raised regarding the State budget and what the possible implications may be with the revisiting of budget. It was stated that the biggest concern around the state budget is around the health supports like Medicare and Medicaid. So, because there are some big changes coming down the pike in a couple of years and they are trying to calculate that out to see what it is going to look like for those funds going forward. For example, are they going to continue to fund it at the same level they always have?–in which case that means there will be less money for the rest of the programs. A vast majority of the state budget does go towards healthcare related costs and there is a lot in the budget that goes towards K-12 costs. Higher Education is a smaller percentage of the overall budget, at about five percent. If they end up having funding problems, everyone is going to take a trim. The trim is a negotiation process between the State and SUNY. The State will tell SUNY that their budget is being cut by a certain amount and then SUNY will determine how that cut will move out to the schools with a formula. Their formulas take into account of different variables and so it is very hard to know at this point. We have a generally healthy budget and if there are going to be cuts for us, what we don’t want to do is invest in a great deal of extra lines and people and have to pull that away from them. We are looking at where we can save funds in non-personnel areas. Having said that, the personnel costs of this institution are between 80-85% so the vast majority are personnel costs, and we do not want to add costs generally at this point when there is uncertainty. They have put some parameters in place. They had more in their reserves than originally anticipated so they have put a certain amount aside saying if the budget gets to a certain amount of money (~$2 billion) then we need to renegotiate the budget. It was added that looking at our non-labor costs, if you look at our energy/utility bills they are about $2.5-3 million a year. So, there are things that we could do in terms of sustainability or alternate energy sources that would enable us to save some money. So, there are things that we are looking at that could potentially help us.
- It was stated that the main take away from this is that we do have this uncertainty with the state budget, which is something that we went through during Covid but in the last few years we have not confronted. JPBC is going to have to be prepared to pivot if something unexpected should happen in regards to the state budget. As a matter of fact, it is part of our charge for the year. It was added that if we look back at the past two or three years and if you look at the way the financials have evolved and you look at the way the enrollment has been such a strong benefit to the financial performance, it is important that we all make sure that the student experience is second to none and then we can retain at a higher rate. That will help give us more flexibility if something were to happen with the state budget. In addition, it was added that this is why investments are still important at a time of budget uncertainty–because you have to invest to see what it is that we are going to do to help us with our mission, project and overall goals. Investing in positions is riskier than investing in programming or something else that is likely to help.
Committee Charge
Members reviewed this year’s committee Charge. The following questions, answers and discussion points occurred:
- The statement was made that we should think of this group as being proactive, rather than a position where we are reactive all of the time. It is more about us understanding and thinking about different scenarios that could potentially happen and how we would respond to them.
- It was stated that as Pell grant funding changes that complicates things in a way that students are now looking for a less expensive school.
- It was stated that when we first heard the Pell news, it was worse than what actually came out. About 35% of our students receive Pell grants. We are trying to understand the impact and what we can put in place to help support them afford college. As you know, our scholarship program is around affordability and the affordability message along with our high-quality programs is resonating among our families. So, your point about getting more students from more expensive institutions, we are starting to see that a little bit because the cost of college is a hard pill to shallow at a SUNY institution let alone a more expensive institution. We are starting to see a significant return on our investment with the scholarship program, but we are still looking at data. With the proactive piece that we are doing, it is going to help us weather whatever storm comes our way.
- The request was made for boarder presentations on our foundation funds, on our reserve funds and how they are kept or invested and what kind of market risks we are thinking about. It was stated that we are not allowed to invest state dollars. The only investments we have are what the foundation can hold. Our state funds are just like a bank account where we put the money and that is the legal position. If we were a private institution, it would be different, but you can imagine why investing tax dollars into a risky market would be inappropriate. So, our general reserves are not subject to the fluctuation of the market, our foundation funds are.
- The question was raised regarding whether scholarships represent discounting in terms of the fact that we are taking a little bit of a loss on the tuition, or is there another angle to that. It was stated that we are not allowed to discount so if we give a scholarship the institution has to fund that gap. So, if we say you get a $20,000 scholarship, we have to find $20,000 to cover that. Private institutions can discount, but we actually have to balance that out. Even if we give them a discount on, for example their room, we have to pay for that. It was clarified that the question about the discount was meant to be functionally like we are taking revenue and lowing the fees for students. It was stated that families would view it as a discount, but internally our language is an investment in a student or scholarship because you can’t just give something away. It was added that scholarship students are bringing us less revenue, but you retain them for four years.
- The question was raised if we are taking less revenue with the scholarships, is that sustainable for the financial health of the institution. It was stated that you have to decide to invest dollars today to retain students for four years of their education. It was added that we wouldn’t get the scholarship students in the first place if we hadn’t offered them a scholarship and we would lose out on any revenue from those students because they are going to choose a different institution that has a more competitive scholarship program. That is the front end of the scholarship funding and then they are going to retain better and have a great experience staying here. We just need to make sure we are looking at both sides of it. In addition, it was added that melt is students that deposit but don’t enroll and in the last two years we were hovering around 25% and the reason was cost. This year, we are seeing 34% and even though we have a very competitive scholarship program, students are cost sensitive, and cost is becoming very important to our families.
- The question was raised regarding whether we are seeing students depositing at multiple institutions. It was stated that we are seeing students deposit at multiple institutions.
- It was stated that our next meeting is devoted to the admissions and enrollment numbers.
Budget Training Overview
Dr. Hallenbeck-McPhall and Ms. Killion provided a training for new numbers and a refresher for continuing members on terminology and the process involved with budgeting. The following questions and answers occurred:
- Appreciation was extended for the presentation.
- The question was raised regarding where to obtain the presentation. It was stated that it can be found in the JPBC Teams file.
- The question was raised regarding when SUNY reviews our submission, are they mostly concerned about our reconciliation, or do they ask questions about budget allocations? It was stated it depends on the analyst, but mostly they aren’t looking at allocations to specific accounts. It is more so trend analysis and if they see a negative allocation, they want you to explain that. They will ask for more details if you have a different cash position from one year to another.
Additional Items from the Committee
None at this time.
The meeting was adjourned at 9:49 a.m.