Total costs of the University’s response to hurricanes Katrina and Rita could be several hundred thousand dollars, University President Stephen Hulbert, said. However, he said initial indications illustrate that almost 100 percent of those costs will be covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.Hulbert said most of the expenses Nicholls faced were from the upkeep of the campus shelters, repair of storm damage and debris cleanup.

“Our costs have run the gamut from the leasing of port-a-potties to getting extra large dumpsters, having trash picked up more often and overtime for custodial, maintenance and grounds personnel,” Hulbert said.

Nicholls is currently preparing estimates of how much it will cost to clean up Betsy Cheramie Ayo Hall, which was used as a triage in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Hulbert said the entire building needs to be repainted, and the carpeting needs to be replaced.

Hulbert said he hasn’t seen any totals yet but imagines the costs to repair the building will be “rather significant and surprising.”

Nicholls is also expecting some level of federal financial support to underwrite institutional costs for accepting visiting students from affected universities. Nicholls enrolled 645 visiting students, with the largest number coming from Delgado and the University of New Orleans.

“By and large among these 645 students you’re going to find individuals’ whose home is the surrounding Tri-Parish area,” Hulbert said. “These are people who left the immediate service region and went to school in New Orleans. Now that that’s no longer available to them, many are back home to go to school at their local university. I expect that we will hear from more of these students in January who wish to enroll in Nicholls.”

To accommodate the additional students, Nicholls increased the number of seats per classes and combined several sections of the same course to be taught in auditoriums rather than hiring additional faculty. Nicholls also deferred visiting students’ tuition and fees.

“We believe we are going to be able to draw down financial aid for these students based on actions being taken both within the state and federal government,” Hulbert said. “Most of the fees are now beginning to be drawn down or collected from the individual.”

Hulbert said Nicholls is feeling a significant continuing impact of both hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the transition to selective admissions. Without counting the visiting students, Nicholls would have lost more than 700 students. Of those students, 246 resigned since Sept. 9.

“We were expecting no more than a 125-student decline in campus enrollment,” Hulbert said. “If it were not for the visiting students, we would have had a significantly higher decline. The University was surprised by the number of students we lost in terms of our projections, but it was one of the realities of the transition to selective admissions.”

The University is also operating under an employment and expenditure freeze mandated by the state commissioner of administration. Nicholls cannot hire outside the University or additional student employees or graduate assistance. The mandate also restricts purchases of equipment and supplies, other than those for instructional purposes, and travel.

“The office administration has a series of employment freezes and expenditure freezes that is restricting the University in almost every aspect of its operations,” Hulbert said. “We shouldn’t even travel to recruit students for next fall or to recruit athletes for next season. I don’t know whether this will lead to mid-year budget reductions. I anticipate it will.”

Hulbert said the commissioner of higher education has asked for a clarification regarding the freeze and exemptions within colleges and universities. At the present time, Hulbert hasn’t heard anything regarding that appeal.

“We have a University that didn’t have a balanced budget to begin with before Katrina, has gone through all expenditures, for which we are hoping to have reimbursement from the state and federal government, and we may have further budget cuts by the state,” Hulbert said. “It is a period of extraordinary uncertainty, and we must be very cautious in how we move forward.