Campus bureaucracy finds new ways to gum the system

Redundancy and red tape are inevitable facets of a bureaucracy. Cal State Long Beach is no exception, especially when it comes time to divide up a budget of $140 million. Anytime money is involved, it seems that bureaucratic safeguards becomes automatic.

We're talking about President Robert Maxson's recent promise to give everyone a voice in planning future budgets.

In an Oct. 6 Daily Forty-Niner article, Maxson promised that "every student, staff and faculty member during this current year will have an opportunity for input to the [resource planning process] task force."

This is the first time a president has made this promise, and the Daily Forty-Niner urges everyone to do his or her best to make him regret it. Clog the system with petitions for every educational desire you can imagine, from essential equipment to petty demands for multicultural, animal therapy classes.

O.K., we're being facetious, but it brings up a point: Just how will the president hear the voice of every single person on this campus, from the lowly freshman to a janitor; from a tenured faculty member to a part-time graduate student?

Will he install a budget hotline linked directly to his home phone? Obviously not, but how, Mr. Maxson, will you hear every voice on this campus?

Presidents on this campus have traditionally followed the recommendations the RPP task force. Maxson has also made a commitment to follow the recommendations of the strategic planning process, Vision 2001, that is developing a long-range plan for the university's future.

In simplified terms, here's how the process will most likely happen:

The president of the university has certain goals he wishes to see fulfilled. In the case of this particular president, he has promised to heed the advice of Vision 2001, the committee in charge of molding the campus into a better university by the year 2001.

The president then gives these recommendations Ñ along with his own goals Ñ to the RPP for review. The RPP decides which goals are most necessary and returns this list to the president, who, after wiping his face, makes the final decisions.

So, the president still has the final say on what is spent where Ñ always has, always will. We like this, as it makes him or her accountable to the campus for those tough budget decisions.