
                         THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
                 Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, June 12, 1994                    TAG: 9406120063 
SECTION: LOCAL                     PAGE: B7    EDITION: FINAL  
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 
DATELINE: 940612                                 LENGTH: CHARLOTTESVILLE

U.VA. OPERATING BUDGET REACHES RECORD HIGH

{LEAD} The University of Virginia's operating budget is at a record high even as state funding for the school falls.

The 1994-95 budget of $902.7 million represents an increase of 2.2 percent - $19.4 million - over last year's budget.

{REST} ``This is the first time we've reached over $900 million,'' Leonard W. Sandridge Jr., the school's executive vice president and chief financial officer, told its governing board Friday.

State funds for the school have dropped from about 28 percent of the school's budget 10 years ago to 13.6 percent of the 1994-95 budget.

In part to compensate for that cut, tuition, fees, and room and board for an in-state student will increase 2.3 percent, to $8,272, for the 1994-95 academic year.

In-state students who do not want room and board will pay $4,480 for tuition and fees, or 3 percent more than this year.

Despite the bigger budget, the number of school employees has dropped to the lowest level in recent years, according to school officials.

``We have seen employment over the last five years go down,'' Sandridge said. The 1995 employment level will stand at 10,595, compared with 11,025 this academic year.

Most of the decrease will come through attrition.

At the U.Va. hospital complex, whose operating costs are part of the budget, a hiring freeze has been in effect for months as officials search for ways to cut costs.

As insurance companies attempt to reduce costs through managed care programs, use of inpatient beds has declined, said Dr. Don E. Detmer, vice president and provost for health sciences.

``In addition, technology that lowers the overall cost of care is being incorporated more quickly as standard practice,'' he said.

The average length of stay at the hospital has declined from 7.3 days in February 1993 to 6.8 days in February 1994. Admissions have been reduced 3.7 percent during the same period, mirroring national trends, Detmer told board members.

Those factors mean U.Va. hospital soon will consolidate the inpatient program at Blue Ridge Hospital, Detmer said.

U.Va. has operated the small hospital, which has programs in psychiatry, epilepsy and physical medicine and rehabilitation, since 1978.

Detmer said the cost of moving the inpatient program from two buildings at Blue Ridge to the main U.Va. hospital could save $3 million a year.

by CNB