The athletic department is expected to be $197,000 over budget

The Athletic Corporation Budget Committee for Fresno State held its mid-semester meeting Wednesday in the meeting room at the North Gym Annex to discuss the current state of the school’s athletic budget.

The committee held a discussion on the revenue earned from the football team’s participation in the New Mexico Bowl as well as the money received from Boise State’s participation in the Fiesta Bowl.

Fresno State received $408,000 for competing in the New Mexico Bowl. The cost of attending the bowl game, such as traveling expenses, food and hotel rooms, slashed the athletic department’s budget by a projected $303,000. In total, the football team earned the athletic department $105,000 after expenses were paid.

Fresno State was rewarded additional money for Boise State’s participation in a Bowl Championship Series (BCS) game. The athletic department received an estimated $252,000 for Boise State’s participation in the Fiesta Bowl.

Even with all the extra money it received, the athletic budget is still in the red.

The budget was stretched this year as some teams had unexpected postseason away games that was not included in the budget at the beginning of the school year.

As a result, the athletic budget is projected to be $93,000 negative for the year, which is an expected $300,000 better than the last projection.

The committee said that they are expected to be $197,000 over budget.

The athletic department will be asked to try to reduce expenses from now until the end of the school year.

Martina Buckley, associate athletics director for business operations and chief financial officer, said that both the men’s and women’s basketball team will be busing to Reno, Nev. for the WAC Tournament.

“We’re doing the very best we can,” Buckley said. “We don’t have any teams over their budget at this time. We are doing our very best to be as thrifty as possible.”

The committee also discussed business and fundraising plans for next year’s budget.

Coleman Barnes, assistant athletics director of development, went over a fundraising plan that is scheduled to be implemented for the 2010-11 athletic year.

The Bulldog Foundation, the main fundraising organization for athletics, will be looking to recruit new members in the coming year. Barnes said that the foundation hopes to have over 5,000 Bulldog Foundation members by September 2011.

“We think it’s doable, it’s challenging.”

In addition, the foundation will ask current donors to upgrade their memberships to either the 110 Percent Bulldog Program or the Take It to the Next Level Program.

“Last year, we had about 600 total donors upgrade their membership, which was pretty impressive.”

The membership upgrades generated nearly $230,000 in revenue last year.

Barnes hopes that recruiting new donors and getting current members to upgrade their memberships will bring similar results for the next year.