Though UF officials previously said they didn't expect mid-year budget cuts, they are now preparing to take another hit this month from the Florida Legislature.
Lawmakers began their 12-day special session Monday to find a way to plug a $2.3 billion budget shortfall, and it looks like UF will not be spared, President Bernie Machen said during December's Faculty Senate meeting.
As a result, Machen announced that UF will likely borrow money from itself to maintain its operations.
Since it isn't clear yet how much the Legislature will cut from UF's funding, UF doesn't know how much money it will have to borrow, spokeswoman Janine Sikes said.
The money will probably come from auxiliary units like the Department of Housing or the University Athletic Association, which don't operate with state funding, Sikes said.
The Department of Housing is a likely source because it usually has money budgeted for renovations and future projects that could be easily tapped, Sikes said.
Machen said during the meeting that UF will have to borrow the money because it cannot enact a budget reduction in the middle of the academic year.
"We have 50,000 students registered, they're going to show up," he said. "All our faculty are on contracts."
Machen also told faculty at the meeting that UF's endowment, which is a pool of private donations and matching state funds that is invested, is down by about 17.5 percent as of the end of November.
That means UF's endowment has taken a $220 million hit, putting its total value at just over $1 billion as of November.
Machen said UF usually brings in about $220 million a year through the endowment.
He said the numbers are disappointing but added that other universities have had it worse.
Yale University's endowment is down about 25 percent and Harvard University's is down about 22 percent, for example.
Machen also mentioned that none of UF's funds were directly involved in the $50 billion Bernard Madoff scandal.
However, he said, "We have a number of significant donors who were impacted heavily by that Ponzi scheme, so we're not unaffected by it."
Chris Brazda, spokesman for the UF Foundation, which oversees investments to UF, said as far as he knows, no donations to UF have been retracted as a result of the scandal.
