It's because the feds and the state have jacked up the number of regulations that colleges have to comply with to get state and federal funding, and those take man hours to deal with. The amount of middle management at the university level to deal with financial add and research grants are staggering, you'd never believe it unless you saw the org charts. This past year, I understand that the local university has 30% cost increases on all heating and power costs. That's a couple of million just to power computing and keep the lights and heat on in all of the billion.. As most state governments are keeping costs the same, and adding regulations that need to be complied with and monitored, of course costs are going to increase.
So you're tellig me it's administrative costs to file paperwork. The campuses I have seen of late all have lots of new construction. That has to be expensive too. Cheaper to build anew than to rennovate?