State lawmakers’ proposal for a constitutional amendment last week to place the UC system under greater oversight by the state of California prompted dissent by the UC Board of Regents.
The legislative measures ““ Senate Constitutional Amendment 21 and Assembly Constitutional Amendment 24 ““ have been spearheaded by Democratic Senators Leland Yee, Gloria Romero and Republican Roy Ashburn.
If passed, the amendment would remove some of the UC’s autonomy by allowing state legislatures to enact policies that can counter the policies of the Regents, as is currently the case in the CSU and community college systems.
The board, however, is concerned that the new measure would allow the legislature to exercise direct control over the UC system.
“We already feel their control as we try to put a budget that has a $500 million hole in it,” said Peter King, media director of the University of California Office of the President.
“One year we are teaching evolution, the next year, creation; we don’t want who is in office in Sacramento telling us what should be on the curriculum,” King said.
But Adam Keigwin, chief of staff for Senator Leland Yee, said the claim that the state will exercise full control over the UC system is ill-grounded.
“It is a scare tactic to try to throw on the smoke screen,” Keigwin said.
The legislation would not alter the Board of Regents’ budget or finances, nor would it change the way the UC currently operates; it would only allow lawmakers to change policies that they believe are abuses on employees and students, Keigwin said.
“While students get fee increases and service workers live in poverty, executives get salary hikes,” Keigwin said, referring to a meeting earlier this month in which the board approved the pay hikes for two new chancellors earning $400,000 each. In the same meeting, which was conducted behind closed doors, they raised student fees, Keigwin said.
Sen. Yee, a UC alumnus, believes the Board of Regents violates the public trust and take advantage of taxpayers through such policies.
“Enough is enough. … This completely outdated model results in the Regents thinking they are above the law,” he said in a press release.
The UC, meanwhile, argues it has no other choice but to raise student fees in order to fill the budget gap and make ends meet for all 10 UC campuses.
“We have had to reduce the man power, even in our own head office, by a third, freeze salaries throughout the system, and cut back on programs,” King said.
“State support for public education has eroded at an accelerating pace, dropping by 40 percent in the last 20 years,” said the UC Office of the President in a statement.
In fact, the changes made to the new 2009-10 budget proposal stand testament to this decline in financial assistance by the state, whose appropriations to cover the cost of educating 225,000 students has dropped from $3.3 billion in the 2007-08 academic year to a proposed $2.5 billion for the 2009-10 year, according to the statement.
King further asserts that the UC is doing its part successfully and has maintained a very high quality of education for over a century, since the granting of autonomy of the UC Board of Regents in 1879.
“I don’t see any upside of taking this management team away and putting it under the control of the state,” King said.
In fact, allowing the state more authority in the matters concerning the UC will reduce funding, cause classes to be over-jammed and diminish the value of UC degrees, King said.
As evidence of this possibility, the UC Office of the President cited in its statement the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education Arne Duncan’s observation on California’s K-12 public education effort: “Honestly, I think California has lost its way, and I think the long-term consequences of that are very troubling.”
Still, Sen. Yee and his co-sponsors are optimistic that the proposed amendment will be passed because it represents a bipartisan effort from statesmen serving different constituencies and coming together for one cause, Keigwin said. Many key student and employee protection groups have also joined their cause.
The legislative proposal requires two-thirds majority vote in both the Senate and the Assembly before it can be placed on a ballot for California voters.