As stated by Chancellor Rosemary DePaolo, the state of North Carolina is facing “extraordinary budget challenges.” But despite this financial burden, the UNCW Athletic Department is spending as aggressively as ever.

The spending spree began in April with the signing of head basketball coach Buzz Peterson. His contract will pay him upwards of $432,000 a year for five years, which is over $100,000 more than what Chancellor DePaolo earns and a 154 percent increase from his predecessor Benny Moss’ salary. With the hiring of Peterson also came the reassigning of Moss, who is set to receive $540,000 over the next three years as an assistant to the Athletic Director.

Then in May, UNCW named Cynthia Cooper-Dyke the head women’s basketball coach and offered her a five-year deal worth a total of $520,000.

So how does Athletic Director Kelly Mehrtens plan on paying these three salaries? Mehrtens attempted to explain the proposed plan in a 45-page document titled “Focused on Excellence: Department of Athletics 2010-2015 Strategic Plan.” The plan offered few economical fixes and actually detailed ambitious and expensive plans heading into the next five years.

The plan gives three concrete areas to increase revenue for UNCW athletics: increase ticket sales by 50 percent over the next five years, grow endowments by 10-15 percent each year and increase Seahawk Club membership to 2,015 by the year 2015.

All three goals are ambitious to say the least, with the most difficult being raising Seahawk Club membership. According to the StarNews, there are currently 777 members in the Seahawk Club, the lowest in the last 10 years. Even in 2002, at the height of the Seahawk Club, membership was just over 1,800. And during that time UNCW basketball was achieving much greater success than it is today.

But the most disturbing aspect of the 45-page plan is that it doesn’t describe how these goals will be accomplished. Raising ticket sales is nice, but how exactly is that going to happen? Last year Trask didn’t even sell out during homecoming.

The plan also details costly improvements to nearly every athletic team. Improvements to Trask Coliseum, the natatorium and soccer stadium are detailed in the plan. Also, the plan calls for the resurfacing of the track, adding a short game facility for men’s and women’s golf, adding an indoor hitting facility for baseball and softball, and adding indoor tennis courts.

Listed in the report under “Priority Needs” is the construction of a Student Athlete Academic Center. According to the report, the building will “house a computer lab, study hall space, academic support offices, new men’s and women’s basketball coach’s offices, needed locker rooms for multiple sports, an indoor golf video instructional room and other sports program necessities.” The building will also hold a Hall-of-Fame showcase room. The student-athlete center is expected to cost around $8-9 million.

Ultimately it is going to come down to athletic success. If UNCW’s most popular sport, men’s basketball, can compete for conference titles year in and year out, Seahawk Club membership will rise and endowments will increase. Victories are the only thing that will justify the incredible amount of spending by the Athletic Department. But if the men’s basketball team continues to lose, don’t expect many of these goals to come to fruition.