Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, December 22, 1993 TAG: 9312220239
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BY BONNIE V. WINSTON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Long
Meeting to review Gov. Douglas Wilder's 1994-96 budget proposals, several of the college chiefs questioned the state's commitment to higher education. They noted that many of the programs and centers Wilder has targeted for cuts are designed to attract businesses and promote economic development.
"I am puzzled by the policy direction of the state," said John Casteen, president of the University of Virginia and the most vocal critic Tuesday. "Too many personal judgments take the place of rational study with proven results."
UVa, Virginia Tech, the College of William and Mary and George Mason University would be hardest hit by Wilder's recommendations. The governor wants to slice $72.9 million from college budgets during the two-year period.
More than $20 million of that would be targeted cuts, eliminating general-fund support for specialized research and public service centers at several institutions.
Gone would be money for the state climatologist at UVa, the Commonwealth Center for Nuclear and High Energy Physics at William and Mary, and support for Tech's Equine Center, among others.
Virginia Tech decision-makers probably will not decide which cuts to fight until after the first of the year, said President Paul Torgersen, who did not attend Tuesday's meeting.
By then, legislators and Gov.-elect George Allen may have weighed in with their budgetary assessments, giving Tech some direction. Now, though, the Cooperative Extension Service faces a loss of 45 positions and $2.8 million, while the research division's Coal and Energy Center and the Water Resources Center would be closed, Torgersen said.
"What we're going to have to evaluate is the extent to which it's important we reverse [these] recommendations to the governor," Torgersen said.
Several other schools, including Old Dominion University in Norfolk, would gain modestly under the budget proposal. State funds for the Commonwealth Center for Coastal Physical Oceanography would be eliminated at ODU, but the school would get $7.4 million in new funds and 34 new workers for Teletechnet, a new telecommunications network that will televise 80 courses at 12 community colleges.
While Wilder's spending plan would give college faculty and staff a 2.25 percent pay raise annually, with the potential for additional bonuses, ODU President James Koch pointed out that half of it would come from tuition increases.
"Our students are very price-sensitive," Koch said. "We can't afford to raise tuition any more."
As proposed, in-state students would face 5 percent tuition and fee increases in 1994-95, and another 4 percent in 1995-96. Nonresident students would be hit with increases of up to 8 percent each year.
Tim Sullivan, president of William and Mary, said the declining state aid leaves Virginia near the bottom of the pack nationally in per-student support.
And the salary proposals do little to help Virginia faculty keep pace with their peers at comparable schools, several said. Eddie Moore, president of Virginia State University near Petersburg, said faculty there receive only 17 percent of what their peers elsewhere can expect.
"What do we have to be happy about?" Sullivan asked.
"This is a massive shift from a state-supported system to a student-supported one," Casteen said.
Listing several industries that recently bypassed Virginia to locate in other states, Casteen said cutting research centers will hurt Virginia's attempts to woo companies dependent on the centers' data and training abilities.
"North Carolina is spending money on research institutes like those Virginia is proposing to abolish," Casteen said. He pointed to the Raleigh-area Research Triangle, "which 10 years ago this state said was too expensive."
"But now North Carolina is reaping the rewards," Casteen said to the nods of the other presidents. "Twenty percent of its budget is going to higher education."
Staff writer Allison Blake contributed information to this story.
\ COLLEGE SHARE\ % OF STATE BUDGET\ 1980-82: 16.0 percent\ 1982-84: 16.3 percent\ 1984-86: 15.6 percent\ 1986-88: 15.4 percent\ 1988-90: 14.6 percent\ 1990-92: 13.6 percent\ 1992-94: 11.9 percent\ 1994-96: 11.7 percent\ Source: State Council for Higher Education
\ HIGHER EDUCATION\ MAJOR CUTS AND ADDITIONS PROPOSED\ \ Old Dominion University: Cut $791,330 to eliminate the Commonwealth Center for Coastal Physical Oceanography; add $7.4 in general and non-general funds and 34 positions for Teletechnet, a new telecommunications network; add $400,000 in general and non-general funds and two positions for the Virginia Consortium for Engineering for a doctoral program in physics in Hampton Roads.\ \ Norfolk State University: Add $1 million and three position to start the university's first doctoral program in social work and to pay for a co-operative agreement between Norfolk State and the Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility.
\ Virginia Tech: Add $500,000 and two people for the Virginia Consortium for Engineering; add $300,000 in 1996 for a new center for applied math; cut $850,000 for the Equine Center; cut $1.2 million to eliminate the Institute of Material Systems and the Wood Science and Technology Center; cut $1 million to eliminate the Commonwealth Center for Coal and Energy Research and the Commonwealth Center for Water Resources; eliminate 45 positions from the Virginia Tech Extension Service; cut $440,000 to eliminate the Center for Volunteer Development.
by CNB