April 13, 1995 - STATE HOUSE VOTES FOR HIGHER-TUITION MODEL
With just 10 days remaining in the regularly scheduled legislative
session, the State House of Representatives rewrote its earlier
tuition policy and narrowly voted 51-43 to provide for increases
in tuition by up to 25 percent during the 1995-97 biennium. Ten
percent of the tuition increase would be considered permanent
with revenues going to the state general fund while up to an additional
15 percent surcharge could be imposed by each institution. The
House tuition increases of up to 25 percent contrast with tuition
increases of 10 percent allowed by the Senate version of bill
endorsed by Washington State University. The vote, which
resulted in the complete House rewriting of Senate Bill 5325,
appeared to widen the gap between House and Senate conferees on
the operating budget, which had already brought about testy exchanges
between House Republicans and Senate Democrats in public budget
"negotiations" earlier this week. However, the House
vote was not strictly on party lines. Eleven of 61 Republicans
voted against the House measure. Rep. Ken Jacobsen, D-Seattle,
the ranking Democrat on the House Higher Education Committee,
joined with Chairman Don Carlson, R-Vancouver, and Republican
Leader Dale Foreman, R-Wenatchee, in supporting the higher tuition
approach.
Expressing concern about tuition costs, the Senate had provided
significant additional state funding to higher education institutions
in the budget, an additional $20 million over the House level
to WSU alone, while mandating tuition increases of 4.3 percent
and 5.3 percent per year. In contrast, House members complained
about "ridiculously low" tuition rates in Washington
State - especially compared with private institutions - and cited
the surcharge as a method for some institutions to generate necessary
funding.
The WSU Reaction - Continued Support for the Senate Approach,
Smaller Tuition Increases
- Washington State University continues to favor the more
reasonable increases coupled with improvements in general fund
support proposed by the Senate Budget and the Senate version
of Senate Bill 5325 (The plan drafted by Sen. Nita Rinehart, D-Seattle,
and approved 28-20 by the Senate on Feb. 10.) A House-Senate
conference committee will probably be responsible for negotiating
the differences between the recently House-passed bill and the
original Rinehart proposal.
- Tuition has already increased 30 percent for the current
biennium and WSU is concerned about placing too much of the
burden of funding higher education on the backs of our students
with another 25 percent tuition increase. The House provides
no significant financial aid package to help students and families
deal with more increases.
- While many legislators assume that WSU's low tuition
policy will cause it to decide not to impose the 15 percent surcharge
if the House plan prevails, the university is also concerned
that failure to raise the tuition surcharge may leave the institution
with a level of funding that is inadequate to provide quality
instruction.
The basic difference between the House and the Senate approaches
is that the Senate recognizes higher education as a joint responsibility
of the student and the state; whereas the House places increasing
responsibility on the student.
- WSU supports the House concept of giving institutions flexibility
in setting their own tuition rates. Five of six of the state's
public four year institutions have indicated they favor that approach.
However WSU would not want to obtain that flexibility by trading
away public support for higher education.
- Revenues from the ten percent mandatory tuition increase in
the House proposal would not be retained by the institution and
would go to the state general fund. WSU is opposed to this
practice of tuition "offsets." If students must
pay higher tuition, the funding should go to stabilize programs
and create access at their own institutions.
