THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, October 25, 1996 TAG: 9610250018
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A14 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: 65 lines
The battle between the Allen administration and traditionalists over the direction of Virginia government continues.
This week's hot spot was the State Council of Higher Education. At issue was whether faulty enrollment forecasting is putting more money in the pockets of some universities than is justified.
Debate on that point surfaced two months ago when a newly installed, Allen-friendly majority on the state council set about questioning the projections prepared by the council's longtime staff.
In an apparent vote of no-confidence, the council majority brought in another state agency - the Department of Planning and Budget - to scrutinize its staff work. The ensuing DPB report was highly critical of the staff's performance.
This week, that staff - led by Director Gordon Davies - had its own day in court before a friendly audience. During a joint meeting of House Appropriations and Senate Finance Committee members, Davies and his associates delivered a spirited defense of their work, along with an acid assessment of DPB's.
This time, it was the DPB analysts who listened with the same glum countenances worn by the council's staff a few weeks back.
Sifting through the charges and countercharges over proper counting techniques and forecasting models is tricky business, and it's unfortunate that the lawmakers spent more time questioning motives than scrutinizing numbers.
Still, answers to several questions are possible:
Are the enrollment projections imperfect?
Yes.
Can they be improved?
Absolutely. Nor does the council's staff seem averse to trying.
Do faulty enrollment projections mean that some institutions get more money than they deserve from the state?
In the late '80s, forecasts were on the low side. In the early '90s, the recession meant that appropriations for higher education were held flat. This year, after the Assembly passed a $200 million increase in higher-education funding, faulty forecasting did result in a few schools getting more money than they deserved.
Can anything be done about it?
Yes. Take the money back. That's what the council did recently with three schools - Old Dominion, Virginia State, and George Mason - whose enrollments fell shy of projections.
Is the Virginia system as a whole overbuilt or overfunded, as the Allen partisans appear to believe, because of faulty projections?
No. Far from running a bloated system, Virginia per-student state funding of higher education remains in the bottom one-fifth of states. And there's no question that enrollment in the Virginia system will grow over the next decade.
The most unfortunate aspect of this episode is what it says about eroding trust within state government. The staff of the State Council on Higher Education has been widely and deservedly praised for its performance over a long period.
This does not mean that it should be immune from criticism or outside scrutiny. It does suggest that those with questions should assume accuracy is everyone's ultimate goal.
If the Department of Planning and Budget can help improve the council's forecasting methods, fine. But interagency spats, conducted in public, aren't the way to improve higher education in Virginia. by CNB