UC Regents Decline Supporting 16 Percent Annual Tuition Hikes

SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) – The University of California Board of Regents said they want nothing to do with a plan that would raise undergraduate tuition by as much as 16 percent over the next several years.

Under the staff proposal, the UC system would have raised tuition by as much as 16 percent each year if the state failed to boost funding. The size of the tuition hikes would have varied based on how much funding the state provided the 10-campus system.

KCBS' Bob Melrose Reports:

If state funding remains flat over the next five years,  the plan calls for basic tuition for California residents to  top $22,000 by the 2015-16 academic year; it is currently a little more than $12,000 a year.

UC Board of Regents Chair Sherry Lansing said they have to come up with other ways to bridge a $1 billion budget gap.

"What should we do? I'm not trying to be funny when I say that," Lansing said. "This is a movement to save the university and not put it on the backs of the students, which none of us want to do."

The Board of Regents did not even take a vote on the proposal seeing that it would garner little support.

UC executives said they will come back with a different proposal in November, but warn that it will likely include some form of tuition hikes.

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