While students enjoy the new furniture and renovations in Morris Library, they may find themselves with less to read.

A nearly $1 million budget cut could force administrators to cancel roughly 18 percent of the library’s journals and other subscriptions, Dean of Library Affairs David Carlson said.

Library administrators began the process of canceling subscriptions to journals and other renewable publications through each department on campus in the fall, he said.

‘We’ve known this was coming for some time,’ Carlson said.

Carlson said administrators asked each department to prioritize the importance of its journals and other materials. The materials deemed least important will be the first canceled, he said.

The journals and serial materials are items that require continuous payments, unlike books, which have a one-time base fee.

Every year, the prices of publications such as journals and magazines increase based on factors such as inflation and cost of production, said Susan Logue, acting associate provost for academic administration.

Logue said that by canceling some of these materials, the library would be able to offset some of the increases.

‘Generally, we can anticipate an 8 percent increase in cost and if the library doesn’t have an increase in its budget, that means it has an 8 percent reduction,’ Logue said.

Peggy Stockdale, professor of psychology and president of the Faculty Senate, said while she is concerned with the loss of resources, she understands the budget issues at hand.

Rob Benford, professor and chair of sociology, said although some of these materials are available on the Internet, he is concerned with how the library will be affected.

‘A number of faculty and students are concerned that while there’s been a very long-needed and impressive renovation of Morris Library … the scholarly materials available within these renovated digs will be diminished substantially by those kind of cuts,’ Bendford said.

Carlson said the cut would affect each department on campus, though each would be affected differently. He said departments using more expensive journals would have a larger percentage of money cut than those departments that materials cost less.

The cancellation process began in the middle of the fall semester and the faculty was notified in December, Carlson said.

Logue said that cancellations would take effect in July with the beginning of the fiscal 2010 year.

Amanda Renner can be reached at 536-3311 ext. 255 or [email protected]