For Immediate Release

March 10, 2026

Students, faculty, local leaders urge Albany to send $41.8 million in state aid to SUNY Buffalo State University and three other cash-strapped campuses to clear multimillion-dollar structural deficits.

Buff State’s $16 million deficit is a direct result of drastic Great Recession-era cuts and more than a decade of flat funding.

More than 350 SUNY Buffalo State University students, faculty and staff took advantage of today’s mild weather to join area labor unions and local politicians at rally against SUNY program and staffing cuts and call for more state funding to close the university’s multimillion-dollar deficit.

Waving signs that said “Stop the Cuts!,” “Fair Funding for Buffalo State,” “Some Cuts Never Heal” and “Hear Our Roar!,” the crowd, clustered on the front lawn of Rockwell Hall at Buffalo State Performing Arts Center, cheered loudly as speaker after speaker pointed to Buffalo State’s recent enrollment gains and the university’s role as a powerful economic engine in Buffalo and the Western New York region. 

"What we want, what we demand, is public funding for a public university,” said Fred Kowal, statewide president of United University Professions, which represents hundreds of Buffalo State academics and professionals who are part of the 42,000-member union. “It couldn’t be simpler. It’s about opportunity, it’s about $16 million. The state budget is $266 billion with a b. This is a pittance.”

UUP is asking for $41.8 million in the 2026-2027 state budget that would go directly to Buffalo State and three other cash-strapped campuses— SUNY Fredonia, SUNY Potsdam and SUNY Environmental College of Science and Forestry—to clear their deficits. 

That would allow Buffalo State to plan for the future and focus on growing its enrollment, which saw a 3.7% increase in first-time and freshman enrollment and a nearly 8% bump in first-year retention rate in fall 2025. 

“Buffalo State has always been a place of opportunity,” said Buffalo Common Council Majority Leader Leah Halton-Pope. “It’s a place where first-generation college students have walked through these doors and realized that higher education belongs to them too. “It’s a place where students from every background find a path forward. So, when I hear about programs being placed on a deactivation list, when I hear that admissions are rescinded overnight and decisions are announced before any decisions have been had, people have a right to ask why.”

Kowal and other speakers criticized SUNY’s so-called stability plan for the university and focused on the many positives Buffalo State provides to students and the community. SUNY’s plan will thwart the campus’ enrollment growth—which Kowal attributed to three years of increased state funding to SUNY. 

While Buffalo State benefitted from the increased funding, it should have been used to clear the university’s $16 million structural deficit, a direct result of Great Recession-era cuts compounded by more than a decade of flat state funding under the Cuomo administration. However, the SUNY Board of Trustees decided against allocating those funds based on need. 

At Buffalo State, SUNY has deactivated undergraduate and master’s courses, cut staff, initiated a hiring freeze and is offering an early retirement incentive with no plans to fill those vacancies. 

Buffalo State Chapter President Lisa Marie Anselmi said that 160 jobs could be cut, which amounts to about 25% of the university’s staff. 

“Eliminating these positions will hurt students, employees, their families and local businesses for years to come,” Anselmi said. “We are told that with this deficit that cuts are necessary and that there’s no other choice. But we know that with the support of the state and SUNY behind us there is a different choice. Public education is a public good.”

“We don’t need more cuts that will gut our campus community, our professors and our programs,” said Buffalo State Student Welfare Committee Chair Elisha Martin. “We cannot afford to lose.”

Other speakers included Grace Bogdanove, president of the Buffalo AFL-CIO Labor Council and Buffalo State University College Senate President Kevin Williams.