The budget is created in the fall semester and presented to the Board of Trustees the following July for approval. Enrollment, tuition and other revenue and expenditures are considered when creating the operating budget.

Tuition, state appropriations and other revenue are put into a general fund, and money is distributed from there.

Breaking down CMU’s money: • Operating budget - $397 million • General fund - $308 million • State appropriations - $80 million • Alumni donations - $675,000 thus far this year

Current budget

There are two separate funds within the operating budget.

There is the general fund, which is the annual budget that supports the academic departments and offices, and the auxiliary budget, which supports the residence halls, the CMU Bookstore and other such areas.

The 2009-2010 operating budget is $397 million, said Barrie Wilkes, associate vice president of Financial Services and Reporting.

The 2009-2010 general fund is $308 million. It was $292,117,380 in 2008-09, Wilkes said.

“Of (the operating budget), $80 million, plus or minus, is state appropriations,” Burdette said. “Everything else is tuition or miscellaneous endowment.”

CMU received $89.4 million in state appropriation in 2007-08, and $82.7 million in 2008-09.

“We expect that our appropriation will be reduced next year from that 80 million,” Wilkes said.

There was a $3 million remainder carried into this year’s budget.

The general fund of the operating budget has two primary sources of revenues — state appropriations and tuition, Burdette said. Tuition and room and board bring in about $259.4 million to the 2009-10 operating budget.

Burdette said 30 years ago, state appropriations made up about 70 percent of the revenue but, because of budget cutbacks, tuition is now the primary source of revenue.

Other revenue is placed into the general fund, which includes grants, interest income and miscellaneous income, including alumni donations if given to a specific area, Burdette said.

In 2008-09, 2,730 alumni donated $2,945,393. So far this year, $675,000 has been raised.

“We are on pace with last year’s goal,” said Chris Austin, associate director of Alumni Relations.

The total donations made from alumni, corporations, foundations and non-CMU alumni totaled about $1.5 million in 2008-09, he said.

“Hopefully, we will be getting a significant amount of gifts,” Wilkes said.

Distribution of funds

On the expense side, there are four major categories — salaries, interest and financial aid, utilities and miscellaneous items, such as supplies, equipment and travel expenses, Burdette said.

“Salaries is the single biggest component,” he said. “We’re a labor-intensive business, so we employ a lot of faculty and staff.”

To estimate salaries, Finances and Administrative Services takes a snapshot of the current payroll to capture the information at smaller levels.

Money is distributed to different departments based on student credit hour production. The more students involved in a certain college or department, the more money will be distributed to them. The credit hours are multiplied by the tuition rate to figure out the total amount, Burdette said.

“We produce, on average, 525,000 student credit hours (annually),” Burdette said.

Certain offices of the university, such as the Registrar’s Office, are given a fixed budget each year.

The second biggest money spender on campus is interest and undergraduate financial aid, Burdette said.

CMU has taken out bonds to support projects, including new buildings. Interest is paid annually on these bonds.

In 2008-09, $8.1 million was put toward interest, Wilkes said.

Wilkes believes the interest paid for 2009-10 will be under $8 million because of lower interest and retired debt.

The third and fourth component, utilities and supplies, includes heating, cooling, electricity, office supplies, equipment for classrooms and travel expenses.

“We have three or four ways we spend the money, two or three ways of getting it,” Burdette said.

Unlike other states, Michigan is able to keep the remaining dollars of the budget at the end of the year, Burdette said.

“We have a goal that we will at least have a balance budget, if not a little left over at the end of the year,” Burdette said.