THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, January 13, 1996 TAG: 9601130005
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Medium: 64 lines
At a public hearing last week, Virginia lawmakers heard Northern Virginia businessman John T. ``Til'' Hazel Jr. formally fault as inadequate the $2.04 billion in general-fund revenue that Gov. George F. Allen allocates for higher education in his proposed two-year (1996-98) $34.6 billion operating budget.
Mr. Hazel, a multimillionaire Republican who supported Mr. Allen's winning bid for the governorship in 1993, chairs the Virginia Business Higher Education Council. He rallied Virginia's business establishment last year to reverse the decline in state funding for higher education that further cuts then proposed by Mr. Allen would have extended.
The funding decline began during the administration of Democrat L. Douglas Wilder, Mr. Allen's immediate predecessor. Mr. Wilder sharply curtailed general-fund spending on higher education to cover rising costs for corrections and Medicaid.
The national economic recovery was under way as Mr. Allen came to office. With corrections and Medicaid costs continuing to climb, the new governor pushed for more higher-education cuts. That was too much for three former governors - two Republicans and one Democrat - and for Mr. Hazel and other business leaders. They protested that Virginia's economic-development efforts would be hobbled unless state government provided more, not less, money for higher education.
The General Assembly, controlled by Democrats, blocked most of the Republican governor's attempt to cut education. An overwhelming majority of the 1996 General Assembly, where Democrats retain the edge, promised the Higher Education Council during the November election campaign to boost the state's higher-education spending.
Mr. Allen promised to be kinder to higher education. His proposed budget would keep his promise. But Mr. Hazel notes that ``only $107.5 million'' of the nearly $475 million in ``extra'' money for higher education that Mr. Allen says he would make available for higher education is in fact operating money.'' Mr. Allen contends that the total of new operating money would be greater - $149 million. Whatever the case (Mr. Hazel attributes the difference to budget gimmicks), the sum Mr. Allen proposes would not enlarge Virginia's annual general-fund spending per in-state student ($4,056) to the Southern states' average ($4,668).
Virginia ranks 42nd in its subsidy per in-state student. The Virginia Business Higher Education Council wants the commonwealth to attain the Southern states' average. Reaching that objective, Mr. Hazel says, would require the General Assembly to vote a total $440 million in new operating money over the next two years.
Whatever the truth, the Old Dominion ought not settle for 42nd place or - a real possibility, depending upon other states' spending decisions - even lower status. But demands upon the state's purse are heavy. The electorate is no more receptive to tax hikes today than in the Wilder years, though Virginia in 1992 (the most recent statistics) ranked 27th among the states in overall per-capita tax burden ($1,984 per year). In per-capita individual income-tax burden ($510), Virginia was 16th; per-capita sales-tax burden ($263), 15th and per-capita corporation-tax burden ($43), 42nd. The General Assembly confronts hard choices.
KEYWORDS: STATE BUDGET HIGHER EDUCATION VIRGINIA COLLEGES
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