CHENEY, Wash. — The Eastern Washington University Board of Trustees will meet this Friday at 8:30 a.m. to receive a report recommending several budget cuts across the university including cost-savings for several sports teams.
The school's Strategic Resource Allocation Report called the football program's current budget "unsustainable," and suggests, "EWU’s leadership needs to consider all options to decrease Football’s uns[us]tainable deficit spending, including moving Football to a lower division."
At this time, EWU officials told KREM 2 that the trustees committed to their previous resolution that EWU would stay a D1 football-playing member of the Big Sky at the last trustee meeting.
EWU spokesman David Meaney told KREM 2, "These recommendations are a starting point for a campus discussion on what areas and programs could be streamlined, reduced or even provided with more funds to succeed."
The report looked at all aspects of university spending, from programs to facilities to sports programs. Some of the biggest cost-saving cuts included bookstore operations, food services, and changes to the football budget.
"It is unsustainable for a university of our size with our budgetary challenges to allow a single unit to accumulate annual deficits as large as the ones listed in this template," The SRA report said about the football program. "At the start of this process, Larry Goldstein, the consultant who developed the SRA process and consulted throughout the process, charged the task forces to consider all options to cut our deficit and said this process can only succeed if there are no sacred cows."
As for other operations regarding EWU's athletics, the report said, "The task force encourages this service to undergo operational transformation and explore additional revenue generation strategies."
This news comes just two years after Eastern had another report from the Pictor Group, which also recommended the school make budget cuts to its athletics department.
On Thursday morning the school sent KREM 2 a new statement in which EWU President Shari McMahan said, "SRA has involved every corner of campus and I want to thank task force members who diligently worked to maintain the integrity of this important process. This difficult work will pave the way for a more stable university as Eastern plans for the future.”
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