The Incompleteness Theorem

Chart from former CFO Agostini's Budget Book     
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No, we're not referring to the mathematical incompleteness theorem. Our budgetary theorem says that if you don't consider the health enterprise, your picture of UCLA's financial situation will be incomplete. 

Former UCLA CFO Agostini, before he said Very Bad Words and got fired, left us with a budget book which we have been reviewing on and off in this blog.* Some of his Very Bad Words denigrated previous UCLA financial reports which - as blog readers will know - we have preserved so they won't disappear.** The most recent one, for fiscal year 2022-23, tells us that back then UCLA had revenues of $11.2 billion of which $3.7 billion came from the Medical Center.*** That was about a third of total university revenue, so it's hard to understand UCLA's fiscal situation if the Med Center is omitted. Moreover, there is a category called "educational activities" that appears to refer mainly to revenues from practice by Med School faculty. The combination of Med Center with these activities brings the total to around 60% of revenues. It's really hard to understand what is happening in any organization with six out of ten dollars omitted.

The budget book - from which the chart above came - updated the previous (denigrated) series by showing fiscal year 2023-24. It tells us that revenues were then $12.8 billion of which $4.2 billion came from the Med Center, i.e., an unchanged ratio of about a third.**** It refers explicitly to faculty practice revenues which again brings the total to around 60% of total revenues. So there is a consistency.

As blog readers will know, the Agostini budget book - after presenting the macro data - then divides the university into micro "units" (which we have reviewed in prior posts) for 2023-24, 2024-25, and a projection - as of Sept. 2025 - for the current year, 2025-26. But the units listed omit the Med Center and faculty practice, a big omission.

One interesting point: Agostini seems to have direct access to the unit data he presented that omits the 60%. But when he presents the full picture, i.e., the chart above, he footnotes the source as UCOP. It's almost as if he didn't have direct access to data on the missing 60%. It's almost as if that 60% is being reported directly up to UCOP by UCLA Health, and that UCOP then uses the figures for its systemwide reports. I'm not saying that is what happened in the past or is happening now. I am saying it looks that way. In any case, someone might want to ask UCLA's interim CFO whether she gets direct data from UCLA Health.

With all the excitement of university CFOs coming and going, there may be another direct source of budgetary information about the omitted 60% piece. Did you know that there is a UCLA Health CFO? In all the reports about the turmoil in Murphy Hall about CFOs, no one mentioned the UCLA Health CFO. In case you didn't know that there was one - and just in case the Academic Senate committee looking into budgetary affairs doesn't know - here is a (paid) profile from the LA Business Journal:*****

Tammy Wallace, CPA serves as chief financial officer of the UCLA Health System. In this role, she provides enterprise‑wide strategic and financial leadership for a $8 billion health system encompassing hospitals, clinics, physician enterprises, managed care, and joint ventures. Her scope of responsibility includes oversight of the revenue cycle, accounting and audit, financial planning and decision support, supply chain, mergers and acquisitions, and contracting. She plays a central role in evaluating internal and external market opportunities, driving enterprise cost-savings initiatives, supporting strategic growth, and advancing the adoption of innovative financial and operational technologies.

Under Wallace’s leadership, UCLA Health has strengthened its financial performance while continuing to invest aggressively in growth, access, and clinical excellence. She has led long range financial planning that aligns capital deployment and margin targets with enterprise growth and market positioning— which will enable more than $10 billion in capital investment over the next 10 years.

If I were on the Senate committee that is trying to understand UCLA's budgetary numbers, I'd definitely want to have a chat with CFO Wallace about the $8 billion for the sake of completeness. I'd want to know what goes to UCOP and what goes to Murphy Hall. That $8 billion, you might notice, seems to be about what Med Center + Faculty Practice would total.

She's in the UCLA directory. I checked. Just a suggestion...

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*Our most recent prior budget-related post is at https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2026/04/agostinis-every-ship-on-its-own-bottom_0145196952.html.

**https://archive.org/details/ucla-budget-book-v-final-feb-2026.

***https://archive.org/download/ucla-budget-book-v-final-feb-2026/UCLA%20Annual%20Report%202022-2023.pdf.

****https://ia903207.us.archive.org/35/items/ucla-budget-book-v-final-feb-2026/UCLA%20Budget%20Book%20v%20FINAL%20Feb%202026.pdf. 

*****https://labusinessjournal.com/custom-content/women-of-influence-health-care-2026-tammy-wallace/. The profile is part of "custom content" (i.e., paid for by UCLA).