GORHAM (AP) – Chancellor Richard Pattenaude on Sunday briefed trustees on a six-month process aimed at bringing “major transformative change” to the University of Maine System.

Pattenaude said incremental cost-cutting efforts won’t bring expenses into line with revenues in the coming years, so he’s looking to more substantive alterations including taking another look at the structure of the seven-university system.

Pattenaude’s proposal calls for a 12-member task force to make recommendations about the future structure of the University of Maine System.

Without changes, the university system’s expenses are projected to exceed its revenues by $42.8 million over the next four years, Pattenaude said. That’s despite $34.2 million in reductions already adopted to balance the current year’s budget alone.

“The university system must pursue deeper and broader change that ensures its academic quality and service to Maine, maintains affordability for undergraduate and graduate students, and achieves operating efficiencies and cost-reductions. We have no choice,” he said.

Pattenaude, who developed the proposal in consultation with the seven university presidents, briefed trustees at their meeting Sunday at the University of Southern Maine. Pattenaude intends to submit his recommendations to trustees in July.

Pattenaude vowed an inclusive effort compared to the last restructuring attempt under Chancellor Joseph Westphal in 2004.

Westphal, a former Pentagon official, rankled university system employees who said he failed to seek the opinions of others.

A proposal to fold the University of Maine at Augusta into the University of Southern Maine was eventually scuttled.

Pattenaude’s task force will include faculty, students and staff, as well as others from the private sector.

Also, the process begins with the assertion that there will be seven distinct universities, each with its own president, said university system spokesman John Diamond.