By TIM ALEXANDER
Illinois Correspondent

URBANA, Ill. — Responding to cuts in state funding, the University of Illinois Extension announced on April 9 a massive restructuring plan that will result in the closing of many county center offices (from 76 to 30), and includes major staff reductions. However, according to the Extension’s Interim Director Robert Hoeft, “this new plan will maintain a local presence in every county.”

A news release from Extension detailed their restructuring goals of administering local county programming from 30 units of at least three, but not more than five counties, therefore reducing the number of county director positions by 46. Many open county director positions have been left unfilled in recent months, however, meaning the actual number of directors affected by the cuts would be “far fewer” than 46, according to the Extension news release.
Furthermore, several center offices, which house Extension educators will be phased out throughout the year. Slated for closure on or around June 30 are centers in Carbondale, Effingham, Matteson, Macomb and Mt. Vernon. In addition, centers in Quad Cities, Rockford, Springfield, East Peoria, Countryside, Edwardsville and Champaign are to be closed at the earliest possible date, contingent on lease terms.

The news left county directors scrambling to put together proposals for merging centers by May 10, before a final decision on the logistics of the restructuring is made.

“We are planning to move forward in discussions with adjacent counties to see how we can ‘partner’ our resources, as well as find the educator expertise (both talent and funding) we will need for programs to be conducted after the centers close,” said Donald E. Meyer, director of the McLean County center, which serves Bloomington-Normal and surrounding communities. “It is possible that some of those center educator positions can be brought to the unit to fulfill programs currently delivered from the centers by center educators in the units where there isn’t already a local educator in place.”

Meyer told Farm World that money saved by reducing the number of county director positions can assist in providing the funding for educators in new units.

“We are considering at least three potential adjacent counties as possible partners,” he continued. “I don’t think we would look at all past a three-county configuration and with the size of county (population and geography) might see if we could even look at a two-county configuration.

“We don’t yet know the final number that will constitute our unit, but it sounds like by May 19 we will have much of this decision-making behind us. I hope to ask my local council in late April several options to consider. Their selection will be what we submit as our proposal to the regional administration for approval.”
Decisions regarding civil service employees will be determined after multi-county partnerships and program priorities have been identified.

The number of educator and administrative positions will be reduced, as well, Extension announced.

Extension did not give an estimate on how many total director, educator, administrative or civil service jobs are likely to be lost as a result of the cuts. With its past budget of around $65 million, Extension supported around 800 people in different job classifications. Around 46 percent of that budget was funded by the state. Extension funding was slashed by $5.6 million as part of Gov. Patrick Quinn’s state budget proposal of March 10. Extension offers educational programs in the areas of agriculture, nutrition and family economics among its many services.