Athletic Cutbacks to Force 'Belt Tightening' This Year

The Harvard and Radcliffe athletic departments will experience a general belt-tightening this year, as cuts in the athletic budgets which they submitted to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences have deprived them of operating funds they thought they would have.

Harvard will be forced to cut back $25,000 in athletic expenses and Radcliffe $10,000.

The $25,000 and $10,000 figures are part of a general austerity program being undertaken by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, to compensate for another year of "tight money" in University finances.

When the two athletic departments submitted their budgets last Spring, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences called for a sizable cutback. Robert E. Kaufmann, assistant dean to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences for Financial Affairs said yesterday that the original reduction came solely from the Harvard athletic budget.

"From the original athletic budget we had to make a cut of over $100,000," Kaufmann said. "But this initial cutback was done with the strict proviso that it would not be taken from the Radcliffe budget."

The Radcliffe reduction is a much larger percentage cut than that imposed on Harvard. $25,000, when measured against the $2.7 million budgeted for Harvard athletics, is a far less restricting cut than $10,000 of the $142,000 Radcliffe athletic budget.

Kaufmann acknowledges this percentage discrepancy in the reductions of the two budgets. But on Monday he pointed out that neither the Harvard budget nor the Radcliffe budget will be less than last year's, and said that the percentage growth of the Radcliffe athletic budget is much larger than that of Harvard.

Last year Radcliffe was allotted $95,000 to $100,000 for athletics. This year the 'Cliffe will have $132,000 to work with, an increase of over 30 per cent. During this time, Harvard's budget has increased at a 6 per cent rate.

Kaufman also noted that nearly $30,000 of the Harvard budget, of which 35 per cent goes maintenance of buildings and playing fields, would be going this year toward renovating Harvard buildings to accommodate women.

Most of the money will be used to provide facilities--or better facilities--for women at the IAB, the Palmer-Dixon Courts, and the University squash courts.

Of the $2.7 million Harvard budget, income from gifts, ticket and television receipts, and participation fees account for about $850,000. Radcliffe has nowhere near such an income to help cover its expenses.

Consequently, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences will have to provide $1.8 million for the Harvard budget and approximately $130,000 for Radcliffe this year.

Where the reductions will come from is still unclear. But what is not so hazy is that in the near future, both the Harvard and Radcliffe budgets will come under the control of the Harvard Athletic Department.

"I would say that by the end of the year we will not be dealing with a Harvard budget and a Radcliffe budget," Kaufmann said. "In the future we will just have an athletic budget."

Harvard Director of Athletics Robert B. Watson '37 concurs. "We are moving toward combining the two athletic budgets," Watson said last week. "In fact, I am expecting notification at any time which will give me authority to oversee all athletic budgets and activities at the University."