Waste is accumulating in Ohio University's top-level administrative offices ' and not just in the trashcans. Twenty-four OU employees are being laid off and eight more vacant positions are being eliminated this month from within Facilities Management. According to a memo from Steven Mack, the director of Buildings and Grounds, these cuts will have no discernible effect on the maintenance of classrooms and restrooms, but offices, lobbies and hallways will receive reduced attention from Custodial Services. The layoffs are the result of a decision to reallocate funds from custodial salaries to a variety of other priorities, including the hiring of three OUPD sergeants and the creation of an administrative position to evaluate campus safety and risk management.
Dave Logan, the president of the employees' union, said employees were upset that the budget reallocation would result in additional administrative salaries at the expense of custodial staff, according to an OU news release. Logan has a legitimate complaint. The university employs a total of 1,412 full- and part-time administrators on the Athens campus, a sum that even exceeds the number of full- and part-time faculty (1,278), according to the Office of Institutional Research.
The university has chosen to dispense with a basic necessity while retaining the luxury of overpaying a multitude of bureaucrats. Hiring more police officers is a good idea, but a cut in custodial staff should not be the source of the funding necessary to make that possible. Instead, the funds should come from an adjustment of top-level administrative salaries. Perhaps one of the many top-level administrators will realize that necessity when the university has accumulated more dustbunnies than students.
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OU should keep necessary custodial staff, curb additional administrative salaries
