Budget analyst: U's administrative costs are still really high

Remember last Friday's presentation on University of Minnesota finances by accounting professor Howard Bunsis, an officer in the American Association of University professors?

He said spending on administration was a big factor in the rise of university costs.

He was confronted at the session by the U's CFO, Richard Pfutzenreuter, who said Bunsis was presenting a misleading picture.

Pfutzenreuter essentially said Bunsis had inflated administrative spending by including categories that either weren't really administrative expenses, or were indirectly tied to instruction.

The brief exchange came up after I'd posted my story, so I covered the basic elements on Twitter:

(Read from the bottom up.)

Looks like a standoff/standstill in that issue. #UMN

MPRAFriedrich Oct 07, 4:09pm via HootSuite #UMN finance chief (Pfutzenreuter) says Bunsis is not using the right numbers, hasn't looked closely enough at U's cost system.

MPRAFriedrich Oct 07, 4:06pm via HootSuite Bunsis says he had no need to call #UMN finance chief. He looked at all public data. Any anomalies should have been in notes.

MPRAFriedrich Oct 07, 4:04pm via HootSuite #UMN finance chief is confronting Bunsis about his methodology, calls it misleading.

In the last day or so I got an e-mail forwarded to me from Bill Beeman, a U professor and secretary of the local association chapter:

He wrote, "Here is Howard's response to CFO Pfutzenreiter's objections."

Here's the main section of the e-mail:

None of this would have changed my approach or conclusions.

Let me first report some more detail which supports the conclusion that administrative costs have increased significantly over the last several years.

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