The president of the Board of Regents announced Thursday night that he has enacted a “system-wide freeze on general education-funded hirings” and “a moratorium on all new building construction projects” to deal with the most recent state budget cut.

David Miles, president of the Regents, said in a statement that he will ask for ratification of the two mandates at next Wednesday’s Board of Regents meeting, which will be devoted solely to the budget.

“At the conclusion of that meeting, we will ask the institution heads to prepare specific action plans to be presented to the Board at its next regularly scheduled meeting on Thursday, Oct. 29,” he said.

Based on the state appropriations to the Board of Regents for Fiscal Year 2010, the Regents will receive a cut of almost $60 million.

University administrators said they were asked not to comment on the cut Thursday until David Miles, president of the Regents, released a statement. The administrators  could not be reached for comment.

Gov. Chet Culver announced in a press conference Thursday that he will not call the state legislature into a special session to handle state budget cuts and will implement an immediate across-the-board cut in state spending. The state Revenue Estimating Conference reported Wednesday that Iowa is about $415 million short in revenue for the current fiscal year, which began July 1.

On Thursday, Culver called for a 10 percent cut to the state budget   — about $600 million. The cuts took effect Thursday.

Under the Iowa Constitution, the governor’s only options when facing budget shortfalls are to call the Legislature into a special session or issue an across-the-board cut.

He said the reason he did not call a special session of the Legislature is because the state needs to act quickly, and, with “250 line items” and “150 voices” in the general assembly, it would take too much time.

“I don’t think the people of Iowa can afford to wait,” he said.

Miles commended Culver’s “quick” actions and said the Regents also need to move swiftly.

“The Board of Regents also needs to act quickly given the potential impact of this national financial crisis on the many important programs and services that Iowa’s public universities and special schools provide for our students and for all of Iowa,” he said.

Jon Turk, president of the GSB and senior in political science, said he is “upset” by the cuts and will discuss them at next Wednesday’s GSB meeting.

“I’m upset by the fact that the state is continuing to cut higher education,” Turk said. “This is the first fiscal year ever that tuition makes up a larger portion of the university budget than state allocations.”

Turk said he and the GSB will still work with the ISU administration to keep tuition increases as low as possible.

“It’s not a shock, it’s just too bad,” he said.

State Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Story, said handling the budget cuts at the university will be more difficult this year because there will be no federal funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to help fill cuts in state appropriations.

“It’s painful all the way around,” he said.

Quirmbach, also a professor of economics at Iowa State, said although Iowa’s situation isn’t as bad as other states, cutting budgets will still be hard for all Iowa departments.

“I don’t think there’s a lot of fat in the state budget,” he said.