START Program Enrolls 200 So Far

By VIC COX

Though early in the process, initial signs of career staff participation in the voluntary time and salary reduction program known as START are encouraging, reported Todd Lee, assistant chancellor for budget and planning, and Carol Houchens, Human Resources' information systems manager.

As of early September more than 200 employees had signed contracts–most for a 12- month period–to reduce their work hours. The average time reduction was 14 percent, which over a year would amount to approximately $1.3 million in savings to the campus, according to Lee's projections.

Salaries may come from a variety of funding sources, but so far, Lee noted, the vast majority of time reduction contracts are by state general fund employees. "Savings from all fund sources will help departments by increasing their flexibility to deal with budget reductions," he said.

The campus's goal is to reduce total expenses by $13.4 million for 2003-04.

"It's been a really good response, and fairly proportionately spread across campus departments," added Houchens, who is coordinating data for the Staff and Academic Reduction in Time program. She said HR had no particular "target" for participation among the approximately 3,000 eligible employees, but "we wanted to see the reductions spread out."

About half of START participants have come from academic units, such as the colleges of letters and science and engineering, Houchens said, with the remainder coming from other campus units.

She said that by the end of July, 90 percent of the enrollees had begun contracted reductions, but some participants continued to trickle in. While summer was expected to be the period when most would take advantage of the START program, which offers participants continued employee benefits and accumulation of retirement credit, timing can hinge on how managers decide to reapportion work loads.

Caution is evident in the fact that 79 percent of current START participants have opted for a 20 percent time reduction or less, and only 12 percent have chosen 30 to 50 percent reductions. Under program rules, 50 percent is the maximum allowed. An amendment is permitted to the individual's START contract if conditions change.

"This is significant participation by the campus," said Lee. He said that if the START pool remained the same–and he knows it is slowly increasing–the year's reduction would be the equivalent of 28 staff FTEs (each FTE represents 2,080 employee hours).

Comparing the initial START data to a similar systemwide program in the early 1990s, known as TRIP, Lee found that TRIP generated about $750,000 in savings during its first 18 months of operation at UCSB. He said that there is "no hard data" on how other campuses are faring with START.