Cal Poly administrators were informed that the California State University Chancellor’s Office gave an ultimatum regarding the College Based Fees (CBF) yesterday morning.
The chancellor’s office gave the university two options if they wanted to keep the CBF in place, a $362 fee increase that 78 percent of the students’ voted for in March. The first option would give one-third of the fee increase to the chancellor’s office to dole out to the other California State University (CSU) campuses. The other option is that all of the CSU campuses get the opportunity to approve similar fees.
“(The CBFs) were passed prior to this year. All 23 campuses face a moratorium on campus-based fee increases for this year,” said Erik Fallis, a representative of the chancellor’s office in a statement.
A “moratorium,” or delay, is no new strategy.
“He is still asking President Baker to hold off on implementation of the increase, as he’s done since the advisory vote was conducted in March,” Associated Students Inc. (ASI) President Kelly Griggs said.
The chancellor’s office raised student tuition by 32 percent this summer in order to deal with a systemwide deficit of $564 million.
The deans of the university’s colleges were among the first notified of the impasse.
Dr. Dave Christy, dean of the Orfalea College of Business, advocated the increase to CBFs.
“The reason we asked students to pass it was to retain the mode of education. Without it we’ll have to increase class size and have fewer sections,” he said.
The state university fee went up 30 percent and tuition for out-of-state and international students rose, but the state appropriation — money from the state to finance each Californian’s college education — decreased.
“Cal Poly was cut about $32 million. The only reason we’re surviving right now is the faculty and staff are having mandatory furloughs and taking a pay cut,” Christy said.
However, the actions taken so far to balance the budget aren’t doing the job.
“Even with the fee increase and furloughs we have less money than before … Our challenge is to circle the wagons and make sure we’re offering the classes our students need to graduate,” he said.
Griggs said a compromise is necessary, despite the chancellor’s desire to keep all CSU campuses on a somewhat level playing field in the form of cost and access to education.
“Additional funding stimulated by the CBF is needed to maintain our programs,” she said. “Even if the fees were approved on a temporary basis, or for an amount even less than the amount proposed, and funding at this time would be helpful.”
Current and former students had mixed reaction to the chancellor’s decision.
Business junior Joe Murrell voted for the CBF increase in the March 2008 referendum. He is frustrated that the chancellor denied the students’ vote.
“It makes me feel like my vote really didn’t have an effect,” he said. “If the majority of students wanted a change, and the students are the ones who attend classes and pay tuition, shouldn’t we be able to have a say that we’re willing to pay extra to keep our classes?”
Angela Kramer, ASI president for 2008-2009, had a different perspective.
“I can understand where the chancellor is coming from because he’s received a lot of negative feedback from other schools,” she said. “I think he’s caught in between.”
Other university’s presidents understand that some student populations can afford a fee increase, whereas some campuses don’t have that option with their students,” Griggs said.
“Cal Poly is already a unique in the fact that were the only CSU that has a College Based Fee, so in these economic times the chancellor is hesitant to allow our university to increase this fee additionally,” she said.
President Baker and Provost Koob could not be reached by the time this article was written.