As part of the effort to strengthen unit-level planning and budgeting committees, two orientation sessions will held for PBC members on Oct. 24 and Nov. 3.
The two sessions will be hosted by Thurman Wingrove, Pitt’s controller in the chief financial officer’s office, and Steve Wisniewski, vice provost for budget and analytics, who discussed the workshops at the Oct. 20 Senate Budget Policies committee meeting.
A memo to all responsibility center heads and Budget Policies committee members reiterated what Provost Ann Cudd and CFO Hari Sastry said in their joint memo on strengthening PBCs —that faculty and staff should be informed about and engaged in the planning and budgeting process.
Responsibility centers were encouraged to have their PBCs formed by Oct. 1. The new annual orientation is designed to educate PBC members on the overall University-approved budget for the current year as well as the budget formulation process.
Input of the unit-level PBCs is more important than ever now because of the change this year to a modified responsibility center budget model that shifts all revenue from tuition, fees and grants to the schools. Each school then will pay a 16 percent “participation fee” — sometimes called a tax — back to the central administration to pay for strategic development and other initiatives. The schools also must pay fees to support shared services, such as Human Resources and IT.
Last year, Senate Council and Staff Council approved a resolution about shared governance’s involvement in the budget process that included language encouraging schools to build up planning and budgeting committees at the unit level so they are actively involved in the budgeting process.
PBC members are asked to attend one of the orientation sessions, which are at:
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1:30-2:30 p.m. Oct. 24
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10-11 a.m. Nov. 3
PBC members should contact their responsibility center heads for details on the Zoom meetings.
— Susan Jones
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