An Update On FY24 Budget Planning and Development of a Three-Year Budget Plan

As a follow up to my January 27 message, I am providing the following updates regarding the College’s budget development process.

This year’s FY24 budget development process aims to be highly collaborative, with Interim Chief Business Officer Michael Hindery and Associate Vice President for Finance/Controller Nicole Yu leading this effort. Michael’s office has prepared a short slide deck that offers a good overview of the FY24 process that I’d invite you to review.

The Senior Staff and I are working closely together to ensure that the consolidated budget incorporates realistic assumptions and projections and that the budgets of all the offices support the College’s priorities. To that end, a series of in-person open forums to the entire campus community will take place in the coming weeks, co-hosted by our Academic Senate and the President’s Office.

Budget planning will be a recurring theme and discussion topic at each event, which will also be recorded. Information regarding time and location will be forthcoming and the current schedule is as follows:

• March 1: Deeper Dive into Transformation 2028 strategic plan
• March 8: Budget Process for FY24, including our new 3-year planning model
• March 22: Enrollment Management and Enrollment Updates
• April 12: Capital Projects

This year we are developing a three-year budget plan which includes the FY24 budget as well as FY25 and FY26 forecasts. We are also developing a consolidated budget that includes all unrestricted and restricted revenue sources including tuition, food and housing fees, and fundraising efforts as well as all expenses and the capital budget. 

The budget process is guided by aligning our expenses with our expected revenue in order to produce a balanced budget. Furthermore, I’ve made clear that proposed budgets need to be aligned with our new Transformation 2028 strategic plan.

With budget proposals submitted, the senior staff and I will carefully review the submissions and based on feedback and assessments, will then make final budget recommendations to the Board of Trustees for their review and approval in May. 

I remain confident that the steps we are taking in our near- and long-term budgeting processes will strengthen Saint Mary’s College well into the future. 

Sincerely,

Richard Plumb, PhD
President