UC tuition-hike reversal not on regents’ agenda

By Katy Murphy, Bay Area News Group

The University of California’s governing board will not revisit its November decision to hike student fees by up to 28 percent over the next five years, despite a plea by one of its own members to reconsider.

A UC spokesman confirmed Monday that the system’s “tuition stabilization plan” will not be up for another vote next week, as new UC regent and former Assembly Speaker John Perez publicly requested the last time the board met.

Appointed to the board in November by Gov. Jerry Brown, Perez has been highly critical of a plan to increase student tuition and fees by up to 5 percent a year through 2019-20 if the state doesn’t give the university the money it says it needs.

Brown, who imposed a public university tuition freeze two years ago, responded to UC’s threat with one of his own, vowing to cut off additional state money set aside for the university — roughly $120 million for the coming academic year alone — if it raises student fees.

In January, Perez argued that the board of regents should reverse its fee-hike authorization during negotiations over the state budget. As tensions between the university and the state escalate, he said, his earlier concern that the hike “would be nothing more than a series of games that use students as a pawn” was proving to be the case.

Perez could not be reached for comment Monday.

The board meets at UC San Francisco’s Mission Bay campus March 17 through 19.

Tuition hikes and UC spending will be discussed March 18 during a preliminary report of the Select Advisory Committee on the Cost Structure of the University — better known as the “committee of two” — consisting of UC President Janet Napolitano and Brown. The two leaders have been meeting privately this year to talk about university spending and ways to cut costs.

[Source]: Santa Cruz Sentinel