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The University of Regina is facing a budget shortfall of $13.5 million for 2020-21 due to COVID-19.
Dr. Thomas Chase, the university’s interim president and vice-chancellor, delivered the news in an email to the university community.
Chase said parking and residence revenues are each down by $4 million, the waiving of student fees such as the recreation and athletics fee means a shortfall of $3 million, and revenues from English as a Second Language and the Conservatory of Performing Arts are down by $2.5 million.
In May, the university’s board of governors approved an operating budget of $238 million that allowed tuition and fees to remain at 2019-20 levels.
Members of the university’s senior leadership team, the Council Committee on Budget and the University Recovery Planning Group are examining ways of addressing the shortfall, Chase said. The university’s board also is to discuss it this week.
“The course of the pandemic here in the coming months is unknown,” Chase wrote. “I am guardedly optimistic that the current budget shortfall — and the measures we take to address it — will be one-time occurrences, but there are no guarantees.
“Please be assured, however, that as we work together through this challenge, we will do our utmost to safeguard jobs.”
Chase noted there aren’t any plans to lay off staff, suggesting the school wants to keep its “complement intact and engaged so we have full institutional capacity when the pandemic abates.”
He added enrolments in 2019-20 produced revenues that kept tuition from increasing in 2020-21, and spring/summer and fall enrolments for the 2020-21 school year were “encouraging.”
The university already has announced plans to continue remote learning in the winter semester, which is to begin in January.
