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The state university system needs to spend an estimated $7.6 billion over the next decade to handle the expected enrollment surge and to meet the backlog of repair and renovation projects.
This preliminary estimate comes from Eva Klein, the consultant who has been studying the condition and capacity of the state system's buildings. She made the report to the Board of Governors on March 19.
"These numbers are not final and I expect the total to be reduced after review," Klein said. "The number should drop as we find redundancies, but I had to tell you where we are on our first pass through the data."
For months Klein had warned the board, UNC system officials and state legislators that the total cost identified by her study would be a huge number. Even with the warnings, the cost left most members a bit stunned.
"I think that all of us feel like we're sprawled on the floor now," President Molly Broad said after the report.
The report broke the estimated costs down into four categories, which were:
* Condition/quality needs, $3.3 billion. This would encompass repairing, renovating and upgrading dated facilities.
* Current capacity needs, $444 million. This would address capacity shortfalls to meet current enrollment.
* Future capacity, $1.65 billion. This would address needs from the expected enrollment increase of 48,000 students over the next decade.
* Other/Special needs, $2.2 billion. This includes items such as land acquisition, dining halls, infrastructure, support services and research services other than laboratories.
One of the most pressing needs systemwide, Klein said, was up-to-date laboratory space. She showed a picture of one science lab at Carolina in desperate need of updating to illustrate that the problem is pervasive.
Broad added that providing faculty with up-to-date research facilities was crucial.
"Having the best labs, instruments and facilities are crucial to faculty and to our universities' ability to compete for top faculty members," Broad said.
Even if the overall estimate shrinks from $7.6 billion, it still will be an overwhelming amount of money. The overall annual capital budget for all 16 campuses this year is only $179 million.
"The issue isn't cutting the pie more fairly," Klein said. "We need to increase the size of the pie."
To that end, Klein said her report would include a number of recommendations on how to provide more capital funds for the 16 campuses. Those ideas will include giving the state system more flexibility in issuing bonds, establishing a private not-for-profit authority to develop housing and other auxiliary facilities, and doing more to encourage private donations.
Klein will issue her final report at the April 9 meeting of the Board of Governors.
In other business, the Board of Governors voted 19-3 in support of a resolution calling on the General Assembly to make the student representative to the board a full voting member. The board's student member currently is a non-voting member and only the legislature can make that change.
Jeff Nieman, the current student representative, is a junior at Carolina and the one of the measure's chief sponsors.
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