University of Colorado says it gives $16.64 back for every dollar it receives from the State

Buffs say they bring in bucks

Report shows university gives $16.64 to state for every dollar it gets from fund

By Matt Branaugh, Camera Business Writer

The University of Colorado, just months after seeing the Legislature give it fewer dollars than it wanted, released a report Wednesday showing its financial impact on the state continues to grow.

The report showed that CU contributed $3.6 billion into the state’s economy last year.

For every $1 it received from Colorado’s unrestricted general fund, the university system pumped $16.64 back into the economy, according to the CU-commissioned study, the first since President Elizabeth Hoffman arrived in 2000.

The study used figures from CU’s fiscal 2002 year, which ran from July 2001 to June 2002. In a similar 2000 study done using 1999 data, CU contributed $11 to the economy for every $1 in state funding it received.

"The impact of CU has grown fairly markedly in the last three years," said Jack Burns, vice president of the university’s academic affairs and research.

CU followed a recipe written by the University of Massachusetts, one emulated by other public universities around the country, he said. The study factors a school’s direct impacts, such as salaries it pays employees, as well as indirect impacts, such as equipment it buys.

The Washington, D.C.-based National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges, using 1999 data derived in similar fashion, says its member institutions chipped in an average of $5 to their state economies for every $1 in state funding they received.

Colorado State University in Fort Collins, in a report authored a couple of years ago, said during fiscal 2000, it kicked $9.59 back into the Colorado economy for every $1 in state funding it received.

Tucker Hart Adams, an economist for US Bank, said CU’s economic impact is significant to Colorado, although the formula probably overshoots the scope. For instance, people may have spent money because of CU, but if they hadn’t, there’s a good chance many would have still spent it somewhere else in the state, she said.

That doesn’t entirely diminish the report’s findings either. "It’s still a big number, an important number," Adams said.

In addition to the dollar-for-dollar comparison, the school said its students, and the friends and family who visited them, shelled out more than $740 million in Colorado during fiscal 2002. That includes $438 million tied to out-of-state students.

Adams said the $438 million shows CU attracted significant new dollars to the state.

The 24,000 people employed by CU at its four campuses also generated enough demand for products and services to create another 18,700 jobs throughout the state, CU said.

"We have a gold mine here in Colorado with CU," Burns said. "CU is a major driver of the economy for the state of Colorado."

Despite seeing the Legislature allocate $155 million to the school for the recently started fiscal 2004 year — in fiscal 1999, CU received $217 million from the state — Burns said the amount CU contributes to the state economy is still expected to grow.

He credits effective work by university staff and faculty to land grants, contracts and gifts, as well as the patient revenue from the school’s health sciences center. Those revenue sources fund about 50 percent of CU’s $1.67 billion budget this year.

In June, CU also approved 5 percent to 10 percent tuition increases for its 50,000-plus students.

Burns said Wednesday’s report wasn’t a special attempt to send any political message to the Legislature, but rather, a tool CU wants to update every two years to show its impact.

Contact Matt Branaugh at (303) 473-1363 or [email protected].

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