Cutbacks in Federal Research Funds Will Result in Campus-Wide Layoffs

Federal cost-cutting efforts this year may force substantial layoffs of research workers at Harvard's School of Public Health and similiar institutions nationwide, labor experts said this week.

Cutbacks in research funding--a result of the Gramm-Rudman law--will primarily affect research workers involved in public health projects and reflects a trend to reduce federal money for social research, said Kristine A. Rondeau of the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers (HUCTW).

Gramm-Rudman, which requires the federal budget deficit to be automatically reduced each year in order to balance the budget by 1991, has deeply cut into available government funding for publicly-funded programs, labor expert David Leach said.

According to new restrictions on federal funding, universities can receive as little as 30 to 60 days notice of the end of their federal financing.

"This short-term warning period could lead to abrupt lay-offs," said Leach, former director of the federal Equal Opportunity Employment Commission.

Faculty members at Harvard's School of Public Health (SPH) are very concerned with the research funding cuts, according to Professor Elkan R. Blout, the school's dean of academic affairs.

"Usually, the last thing you think of cutting is personnel, but it looks like personnel cuts will be necessary within the next year," said Blout. Approximately 70 percent of SPH's $19 million in federal grant money is used to pay researchers' salaries.

Rondeau said there had been past layoffs in public health research areas, such as nutrition and epidemiology. "There have been some layoffs in the past as a result of research money being cut back," she said. "But usually the departments just let people go temporarily, and then they try to rebuild."

Blout said that layoffs this year, due to Gramm-Rudman, will not be temporary.

"It is not an optimistic picture" for otherpublic health research institutes, Blout said,explaining that both the National Institute ofHealth and the National Science Foundation willexperience across-the-board cuts this year.

Harvard may not be as deeply affected bygovernment cuts as institutions with smallerprivate endowments, said Elizabeth C. Huidekoper,director of Harvard's Office of Budgets.

The university, whose endowment totals over $3billion, recieves approximately $118 millionannually in federal research funding, she said.

"The first round of Gramm-Rudman cuts are onlyabout 5 percent. This is very important money, andthe cuts will be a burden, but lots of peoplewouldn't lose their jobs" if the law remains ineffect, said Huidekoper.

Rondeau wants Harvard to cut back in areasother than personnel. "Harvard technical workersare very low-paid, so, if we are lucky, whenresearch funds are cut, it may be more profitablefor departments to cut back in other areas," saidRondeau.

Rondeau said she has little influence in thedecision because research workers are notunionized. For the past decade, HUCTW's leadershave been trying to organize Harvard's clericaland technical workers, the only group of Harvardemployees not represented by a certified union.

Harvard has not yet laid off any researchworkers, Rondeau said.

The initial Gramm-Rudmann funding cuts wentinto effect March 1, but universities areuncertain about the precise effects of the lawfollowing a federal court ruling that struck downthe automatic deficit-reduction process asunconstitutional. The Supreme Court is currentlyreviewing the law