Federal budget cuts threaten UNC research

While President Barack Obama is promising to limit federal cuts to scientific research, a new proposal from the Republican leadership would do just the opposite.

A proposed budget in the U.S. House of Representatives calls for a 9 percent cut in non-defense federal spending, which would lead to cuts in funding for institutions that provide funds to universities for research.

The cuts would affect organizations like the National Science Foundation, NASA and the National Institutes of Health.

U.S. Rep. David Price, D-N.C., said the cuts, which are meant to help alleviate the federal budget, might hinder more than help.

He said Republicans are talking about balancing the budget by cutting funds that go to Pell grants and medical research.

“Here we are talking about a small fraction of the budget,” Price said. “They are talking like that is where the big spending is from and it is untrue.”

He said the money that is being cut only makes up about 12 percent of the country’s budget.

“When they make the cuts it won’t balance the budget but will do great damage to education and efforts invested in solving things,” Price said.

If these cuts are implemented it could hurt research at UNC-Chapel Hill, said Barbara Entwisle, interim vice chancellor for research and economic development.

She said the impact of the cuts would depend on whether cuts were made to existing programs or planned future programs.

“It depends on how these agencies will respond,” Entwisle said. “It is clear that this would be a very negative influence. It would be very hard on researchers.”

She said the University is working on a plan that will take into account the financial realities at the federal and state level.

“We are just putting the pieces together now,” she said. “It is hard to know what it means right now.”

If the cuts are implemented, it will likely be more competitive for researchers to get grants from institutions that experience cuts.

That could mean not as many researchers will get funding, Entwisle said.

“It will be a real shame to not be able to continue at the real level,” she said. “I am very concerned about the nature of the discussion and likely cuts at federal and state levels.”

The number of federal grants to the UNC system could also be affected if the cuts to research institutions are large enough, said Steven Leath, vice president for research for the system.

“If the pool of money gets reduced further, we will find that really good science programs won’t get funded and that will cause a lot of problems with solving stuff and creating jobs,” Leath said.

He said the system doesn’t know the exact impact of the cuts because the amount of them is unknown.

Leath said the system’s total budget is about $8 billion and research accounts for $1.4 billion.

Leath and Entwisle said they’ve heard the budget could be reduced so it is equal to the 2008 budget.

That would mean reducing the $1.4 billion research budget to $1.1 billion for the system, Leath said.

“There is potential there to be really damaging,” he said.

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