INSTITUTE, W.Va. (AP) - West Virginia State University plans to eliminate 16 positions, the school said Thursday.
The announcement was made after an emergency meeting of the Board of Governors, The Charleston Gazette-Mail reported. The board met in closed session during the meeting and returned to its public online meeting, voting to authorize eliminating the jobs.
“The vote was giving the president the authority to eliminate particular positions, which we do reluctantly,” said West Virginia State professor Frank Vaughan, the faculty representative board member.
“We gave her the authority today,” he said. “What she does with it, it’s up to her. I know she makes these decisions very carefully and reluctantly.”
The university said in a statement the move “is one of several measures the university will be taking in conjunction with a hiring freeze for non-essential positions, reduced spending, and other cost saving measures.”
At a board meeting two weeks ago, university administrators suggested possible across-the-board salary reductions or a layoff of 19 unnamed people and positions.
“In view of our current enrollment, we certainly want to get those up, but we’ve taken a double hit with coronavirus and so we have to do the responsible thing here, because the institution has to be maintained,” board member and attorney Katherine “Kitty” Dooley said at that meeting. “And so I think it’s really past time for us to be looking at these serious issues.”
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