It appears from the letters to the editor in the Mountain Xpress that most of the writers support maintaining the urban forest on land owned by UNC Asheville. I take the opposite position. As a graduate of the workforce, I moved to Asheville to enjoy time in the mountains hiking and kayaking. I retired after over three decades as a university educator at a public university in my state.
UNCA is cash poor and land rich. Currently, UNCA is at a critical level in the evolution of its curricular offerings and in the number of students attending the university. This spring semester, there are less than 3,000 students that are degree-seeking. Compare this number to Western Carolina University with over 11,000 students and Appalachian State University with over 20,000 students.
UNCA’s endowment is $70 million. Western Carolina has an endowment of $130 million, and Appalachian State has an endowment of over $190 million. The smaller an institution is in higher education, the more difficult it is to offer a wide array of curricular opportunities for students and to expand its program offerings. UNCA has been running a deficit. It has cut both academic programs and people.
At the same time, despite there being a surplus in the state treasury, the North Carolina legislature has been less than friendly in supporting the needs of our public universities. Currently, the Trump administration is making major cuts of federal funding to universities throughout the country.
UNCA needs to generate a significant positive cash flow so that it can expand its program offerings, maintain its physical facilities and instructional equipment, supplement student tuition and fees, and create a salary schedule that recruits and retains the best faculty and staff. To accomplish this, UNCA needs to find creative ways to generate an income flow from its land holdings to supplement its other sources of income.
Asheville and the surrounding area need UNCA to be a vibrant institution that has a synergetic impact on our community. Asheville and the surrounding area do not need a UNCA that has to continually make cuts that create institutional and academic anemia in order to balance the books.
For many reasons, these are difficult times in higher education. This is not the time to have a not-in-my-backyard mentality. This is not the time to slay the goose that can produce golden eggs. The intentions of the UNCA administration to utilize the resources of the urban forest to strengthen the university are based on both necessity and good intentions. They know what they are doing. They know why they are doing it. They should be trusted.
— Richard Boyum
Candler
