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The Gatepost
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79 l number 6
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gatepost@framingham.edu
Framingham State College’s Independent Student Newspaper Since 1932
Significant funding cuts expected should Question 3 pass By Rakel Hjaltadóttir News Editor Framingham State students and faculty are worried about the impact a sales tax cut initiative will have on the school’s funds. Question 3, which will appear on the ballot on Nov. 2, is a measure to lower the Massachusetts sales tax from 6.25 to 3 percent. The initiative is sponsored by the Alliance to Roll Back Taxes, led by Carla Howell. Howell ran for governor in 2002 for the Libertarian party. According to The Boston Globe, of the 45 U.S. states with a sales tax, Massachusetts can be found in the middle, and 23 states have a lower tax rate. There is no tax on food, clothing up to $175 or consumer services, which many states have. If Question 3 passes and the sales tax is lowered to 3 percent, Massachusetts will have the second lowest tax rate of all the states which have a sales tax. During a visit to campus last week, Lt. Gov. Timothy Murray said he is against the measure. “I think it’s incredibly important that everybody be cleareyed what the impact of it will be - we’re talking a couple billion dollars in lost revenue.” According to a report created by the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation (MTF) titled “Question 3: Heading over the Cliff,” the state is already facing a $2 billion shortfall, which will increase to $4.5 billion if Question 3 is approved. The MTF is an independent, non-partisan research organization created in 1932. The focus of the foundation is how the state raises and spends its money. According to the President of the MTF, Michael Widmer, the foundation is “neither pro-tax nor antitax.” He said this proposal comes at the worst possible time because the state faces a large deficit in FY12 because federal stimulus money, which has supplemented the budget during the last two years, will have run out. Widmer added, “What we’ll see is just dramatic cuts in all state programs including aid to cities and towns and public higher education,” if the question passes. “It’s massive. This is not a little surgery. It would change the face of state and local government as we know it, as we’ve known it for decades,” he said. Murray added, “It’s that revenue that pays for the
Students enjoy this month’s Bingo in the Forum. services we all benefit from in some shape, manner or form. The governor and I think a more reasonable approach is to go back to 5 percent.” He said the initiative will impact everything in the budget, such as higher education, K-12 education, local aid and programs for veterans, seniors and the developmentally disabled. According to Murray, state colleges and universities are struggling already to maintain programs and keep tuition and fees reasonable, and with a further reduction in state aid, the institutions will increasingly have to rely on higher tuition and fees to pay for the services they provide. “We support our state colleges and universities and community colleges because they’re affordable and they provide a quality education. If they’re having to rely primarily on tuition and fees more than they already do now, it’s just going to make the cost of an education less affordable,“ Murray said. Widmer said, for example, “[At] Framingham State College, you would see a huge cut on top of the cuts they’ve already seen over the last three years.” In addition, he predicts course offerings and faculty time will be reduced. In an unscientific survey of 400 students conducted by The Gatepost between Oct. 6 - 15, 42 percent of survey takers responded that they did not support lowering the state sales tax to 6.25 percent, while 37 did. Two-hundred and sixty-five survey respondents, or 66 percent, did not know what impact the cut would have on public institutions. [Editor’s note: The Gatepost will be running an article based on the survey results in next week’s issue.] Widmer said he thinks there
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Kelsey Loverude/The Gatepost
Phase 2 of library renovations nearing completion
By Pam Barberio Editorial Staff
Senior Vice President of Administration, Finance and Information Technology Dr. Dale Hamel anticipates that renovations to the Whittemore Library are expected to be completed soon. Requests from library staff have gone back several years now for “a desire to kind of enhance the facility - to have it be more conducive to a kind of learning resource center as opposed to a traditional library,” Hamel said. No renovations have been undertaken in the library since it was built in 1969. The phase 2 renovations, which are predominantly on the righthand side upon entering the library, will include a new lounge area, as well as new HVAC systems, lighting and new ceilings. The lounge area will supply coffee from a local provider which has yet to be determined. Hamel said Dunkin’ Donuts was asked to provide the coffee in the lounge, but declined the college’s offer. The second of six phases of reconstruction began over this past summer. However, work began later than originally planned. Hamel said, “There’s some delay in the lighting fixtures, so it [the completion date] really kind of depends on when those come in, hopefully late October. “We’re trying to limit the impact on group and individual study work as well as classes [by] limiting the number of individuals that are working at a time and actually doing a lot of the work overnight as well,” he said. Secondly, the funding for this project “was only approved as a part of the FY 2011 General Appropriations Act, so we didn’t receive the money until July,” Hamel said. The timeline of the project extended into the school year. -Continued on page 6