A couple of weeks ago, University of Washington President Mark Emmert said his university would have to lay off people in the next three weeks. Those layoffs hit today: 36 unfilled positions, 34 staff positions and 16 full-time to part-time conversions were made, all in the development, marketing and alumni relations departments.
The layoffs were not, however, due to state budget cuts, according to the university. Instead, they were from a department funded by an endowment. The endowment’s investments tanked, so they had to save $6 million.
The rest is from the press release:
“Sadly, this is the first wave of layoffs in the current economic climate that the university faces, but it is not likely to be the last,” says UW President Mark Emmert. “These cuts occurred because of losses in the stock market. A lot of good, talented people are being forced from their jobs as a result. When the state legislature adopts its budget for the coming two years, we are anticipating budget cuts that would result in much larger numbers of people losing their jobs here.”
The University has estimated that 600-800 state-funded positions would be lost under proposed budgets before the Legislature.
Employees were notified of the changes today, which affect roughly 20 percent of the unit’s staff. The cuts will save about $6 million out of the unit’s $30 million annual budget.
