Voters prefer higher taxes than higher student fees for UC/CSU

[alp227]

From the press release of a Public Policy Institute of California poll released today:

What steps would residents be willing to take to raise revenue for colleges and universities? They are divided on whether they would pay higher taxes to maintain current funding (49% yes, 49% no), with a strong partisan divide (64% of Democrats yes, 51% of independents and 69% of Republicans no). However, Californians’ willingness to pay higher taxes has increased over the last year (41% yes, 56% no in 2009). And they are much more likely to favor raising their own taxes than to raising student fees to maintain current funding (35% yes, 62% no). Opposition to raising student fees holds across party lines (63% Democrats, 60% Republicans, 59% independents). (The PPIC survey was taken before the University of California proposed, and California State University approved, fee increases earlier this month.)

Yet those same voters (narrowly) passed Proposition 26, a proposition that sought to require a 2/3 vote for any tax increase and clarified what "fee" and "tax" meant.

[pinboy3niner]

1. UC tuition to rise 8% for next year

UC tuition to rise 8% for next year
Regents vote 15 to 5 for the increase, meaning undergrads will face $12,150 per year in tuition. The move meets little outcry. Financial aid also is expanded.

By Larry Gordon
November 18, 2010|7:51 p.m.

Reporting from San Francisco — The basic cost of an undergraduate education at the University of California will rise 8%, or $822, next school year after a regents vote Thursday, although officials said that expanded financial aid would shield many students from paying the higher amount.

The UC Board of Regents, meeting in San Francisco, voted 15 to 5 for the increase, together with a one-year reprieve for most families earning less than $120,000 annually. The regents also changed the name of the educational charges to students from "fees" to "tuition," a linguistic acknowledgment that the amount has tripled in the last decade.

Starting next fall, undergraduates who receive no aid will face about $12,150 per year in tuition and campus fees and an average of about $16,000 more for living expenses and books.

Thursday's actions came with some emotional debate from regents and other speakers but without the angry protests and arrests that accompanied Wednesday's preliminary discussions. Only about 25 students attended Thursday's meeting, and there was no picketing or chanting inside or outside the UC San Francisco meeting hall.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-uc-20101119,0,415886.story