Administration discusses potential savings from new efficiency measures


Administrators highlighted Washington University’s efforts to cut costs without affecting services at a public forum on Wednesday morning.

At the beginning of 2013, the University retained the services of Huron Consulting Group to find methods to reduce expenditures in four areas where other universities have implemented similar measures. These areas are facilities, product purchasing, research administration and the management of support services associated with the Central Financial Unit, which funds services such as Olin Library, Student Health Services and the Career Center.

Displaying Huron Consulting’s three primary recommendations for the University, Executive Vice Chancellor for Administration Hank Webber said that the group’s suggested efficiency measures could save the University an estimated $10.8 million—though he said he expects the total to be slightly higher.

The presentation opened with a discussion of the University’s revenues and expenses by Vice Chancellor for Finance Barbara Feiner, who discussed the state of the University’s endowment. The endowment lost much of its market value from 2008 to 2009 due to the economic downturn, but by the end of fiscal year 2013, Feiner said, the old endowment had returned to its 2008 value of $5.4 billion. Returns on endowment funds added since 2008 bring the total market value to $5.7 billion.

Following Feiner’s overview, Webber explained to an audience of University faculty and staff in Edison Theatre the measures the University is planning to take to improve efficiency, which he described as comparable to steps taken at other universities such as Cornell University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

“We have to grow more slowly than we’ve grown in the past,” Webber said. “We want to deliver better service and do it more efficiently.”

Webber discussed the different areas in which the University seeks to cut costs, including several in the area of product procurement. He mentioned that in some cases, the sheer number of choices available to the University can lead to inefficient spending, citing pens as an example.

“You can buy 300 types of pens at Washington University…I’m not sure that’s necessary to academic freedom,” Webber said, to chuckles from the audience.

After the administrators’ presentation, faculty and staff members from across the Danforth and medical school campuses asked questions about the presentation and voiced their concerns with University finances.

In response to an audience member’s question about steadily rising tuition costs, Webber stated that, although they made up only 13.6 percent of the overall University operating revenue, student tuition and fees were an important component of the Danforth Campus’ revenue—$299.8 million of a total $536.5 million in the 2013 fiscal year.

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