California Legislature approves budget with $100M more for UC funding
By Ryan Leou
June 15, 2016 9:45 p.m.
The California Legislature approved a budget allocating about $100 million more in general funds to the University of California than last year to increase residential undergraduate enrollment for the 2017-2018 year.
The Legislature will give an additional $18.5 million for the UC if it enrolls 2,500 more students for the 2017-2018 academic year. The UC will enroll an additional 5,000 students for the 2016-2017 year, with UCLA enrolling about 750 more students. However, it also expects the UC to adopt a policy limiting the number of nonresident students enrolled.
Legislators also called for the UC Board of Regents to adopt a plan to increase the number of bachelor’s degrees awarded by 250,000 by 2030 and improve academic achievement of underrepresented minorities.
The budget asked the regents to report revenue, expenditures and enrollment figures to the State Department of Finance. It also requested the regents review policies governing outside employment by university executives and senior management, and ensure outside employment does not create conflicts of interest.
In late April UC president Janet Napolitano suspended UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi for taking board positions with a for-profit university and a textbook publisher and received hundreds of thousands of dollars, which some critics called a conflict of interest.
In addition to the general fund money for academic expenditures, the budget gives additional money to the UC to help it pay down its debt.
The legislature allocated $171 million for the UC Retirement Plan to help pay down its debt. The funding requires the UC to restructure its retirement benefits and limit eligible pay for pensions, as specified in the Public Employees’ Pension Reform Act of 2013. The UC regents approved a plan limiting eligible pay for pensions with a two-tiered pension plan at their March meeting.
On top of higher education spending, the $171 billion state budget included provisions preparing for potential financial downturns and increasing welfare spending for California children and families.
The legislature reserved $2 billion for the state’s rainy day fund, money stored for later use when tax revenue is lower than expected or spending is higher than expected.
The budget also ended the policy of “maximum family grants” which prevented families from receiving additional welfare benefits if they had additional children while already receiving benefits.
Gov. Brown must sign the budget by June 30. Brown can line-item veto any spending provisions in the budget.
