* Vickers is the second key person in development (same thing as fund-raising) to announce plans in the past month to leave Bulldogs athletics. Danny White, the department's associate athletic director for development for two years, left recently to take a similar position at University of Mississippi.

* White and Vickers were instrumental in landing the $10 million pledge to athletics from former Bulldogs linebacker Alphonso Bigelow and his company, NykelBam, LLC.

Bigelow's pledge was announced at a university news conference in mid-June.

At the news conference, Fresno State athletic director Thomas Boeh gave a brief history of the Bulldog Foundation's evolution as a fundraising organization. Here is Boeh, as quoted in "Summer 2009 Bulldog Sports," the Bulldog Foundation's official magazine:

"About five years ago a group was formed under the direction of President Welty and some others in the room, to look into how we could combine fundraising at Fresno State into the athletic department and how we could take the next step.

"And from that group, a new Bulldog Foundation restructuring came out of it with an aggressive approach to building the annual fund as well as pursuing philanthropic gifts and capital gifts.

"You can see that today we are meeting some of those goals that were set five years ago by the Bulldog Foundation under the very terrific leadership of Danny White and the support of Jay Vickers and his staff. The Bulldog Foundation continues to evolve."

* Coleman Barnes, who joined the Bulldogs staff in August 2008 as assistant athletic director of development, is now the Bulldog Foundation executive director and has assumed direction of the development office. Before coming to Fresno State, Barnes was employed by the fundraising unit for Ole Miss athletics.

* Clinton Moffitt, the university's associate vice president for financial services, said student fees are expected to jump 30% this year. He didn't say so, but everybody at the meeting knew the culprit -- the state budget crisis.

The fee increases will mean an extra quarter-million dollars added to the annual cost of providing scholarships to Bulldog athletes, Moffitt said.

The Bulldog Foundation's primary task every year is footing the bill for athletic aid. The 2009-10 athletic department budget, approved last spring before Fresno State officials knew the precise scope of fee increases, projected the cost of athletic aid at $4,882,155.

"Our expectation from the Athletic Corp. is they [Bulldog Foundation] will continue to fund all the expenses of athletic aid," Moffitt said.

* Budget committee members reviewed numerous documents during their discussion, but university officials said none of them would be made public until President John Welty has signed the 2008-09 financial statement and the revised 2009-10 budget.

* However, I thought I heard an official tell the committee that the recent Bulldog Foundation Annual Fund drive, the key effort to generate donations for scholarships and season-ticket sales for football and men's basketball, produced 2,737 donors. Of these, 568 were upgrades, which produced an additional $200,000, and 114 were new members, generating an additional $98,000.

The question is whether those 2,737 donors also represents the size of the Bulldog Foundation's membership. No one discussed this at the meeting.

Bulldog Foundation membership in 2003 was 5,435. In 2007, it was 4,447.