UNLV, UNR funding would dip under new formula presented to Nevada lawmakers

Yahoo

12-03-2025

LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — A rebuilt funding formula for the state's colleges and universities became a target for officials Tuesday during a budget hearing in Carson City.
Lawmakers and leaders from the Nevada System of Higher Education (NSHE), seemed to agree on one thing: The formula doesn't do much more than shift money around in ways that don't satisfy anyone. And not enough money, according to some officials.
Gov. Joe Lombardo's proposed budget for NSHE in the 2026-27 biennium is $2.7 billion.
Nevada Senate Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro, a Las Vegas Democrat, questioned whether lawmakers should approve NSHE's proposed formula. 'Based upon your answers today, that what we have is a funding formula that is not working for two of the largest institutions here in the state,' she said. UNLV and UNR would lose a combined $42.5 milllion that would go to smaller schools.
Patty Charlton, interim chancellor at NSHE, responded, 'I would agree that — and I think if the presidents were all to come up they would say — that the funding formula didn't work for any of them as a whole.'
Charlton argued for the opportunity to tweak the budget formula going forward, while Cannizzaro asked if it would be better to just get the formula right from the start.
Looking to add context, Charlton described the formula as it exists now as a distribution model that has changed over the years. Charlton was part of the 2013 effort to change the formula, and it resulted in the elevation of UNR and UNLV to R1 research institutions, she said.
'Yes, this needs to be a work in progress. We need to continue to work with your staff and with the institutions to really define where we need to go as a state,' Charlton said.
Cannizzaro invited leaders from UNLV and UNR to weigh in, and that led to comments on existing funding levels.
'The net funding per FTE (full-time equivalent student) in Nevada is the lowest in the country,' UNLV interim leader Chris Heavey said. 'And so essentially all of our institutions are working on a shoestring budget.'
Heavey stepped into the role when UNLV President Keith Whitfield resigned on March 3. The statistics he cited show Nevada funds higher education at about 63% of the national average, based on FTE funding.
'It is a struggle. We're in national competition to hire faculty and to retain our faculty and it is sometimes a struggle for us to compete with other R1 institutions,' according to Jeff Thompson, executive vice president and provost at UNR.
Heavey added, 'We often say we are R1 institutions funded at an R2 level.'
UNLV is about $120 million short of budgets at other R1 institutions, Heavey said.
Even so, he acknowledged the need for more funding at the state's community colleges. 'The two-year institutions are more underfunded than the four-year institutions,' he said.
NSHE is the governing body for:
UNLV
UNR
Desert Research Institute
Nevada State University
College of Southern Nevada (CSN)
Great Basin College
Truckee Meadows Community College
Western Nevada College
NSHE's budget challenges don't stop with problems with the formula. The Board of Regents increased student fees at all the state's colleges and universities by 5% recently to help pay for cost-of-living raises for employees who were left out when the state doled out pay raises in 2023. NSHE also delayed raises to help cover the cost.
Now, they have to pay for those raises going forward, and they want the state to kick in.
No one on either side of the aisle in the Nevada Legislature is happy about that.
Republican Minority Floor Leader Assem. Gregory Hafen II remarked, 'Aren't you guys your own branch of government now?'
His sentiment matched comments by the majority Democrats.
'I want to understand why those decisions were made and now, why they are coming back to us to fill the hole that basically they created,' Hafen said.
Budgets for capital projects were not included in Tuesday's hearing. NSHE cited a backlog of $376 million in maintenance projects for campus facilities. The budget is expected to allocate $15 million.
Another $50 million is needed for safety/security equipment to improve all the state's campuses in the wake of the December 2023 shooting at UNLV that left three faculty members dead. Only a fraction of that amount is expected to be approved in the budget.
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