Higher education unions at the City University of New York and at the State University of New York went into high media gear this April as they worked to convince the state Legislature of the unacceptably dire consequences of funding cuts.

"If you think education is expensive, try ignorance," read billboards around the state Capitol in Albany. They were posted by United University Professions, the union representing faculty and academic staff at SUNY. The union has sent hundreds to lobby the Legislature since Gov. George Pataki released his budget proposal in January. The governor seeks a cut of $183.5 million to be offset by a tuition hike of $196.9 million. The effect of the cut, UUP president William Scheuerman has pointed out in testimony before legislators, could be a loss of 4,000 faculty positions--"the equivalent of closing four four-year campuses serving over 17,000 students," he noted in February.

The City University of New York faces its own set of financial shaftings. In addition to the governor's proposed cuts of 12 percent at the senior colleges and 19 percent at the community colleges (a total $105 million reduction in state aid), CUNY also has to bear ongoing underfunding by the city of New York. Gov. Pataki is proposing a 41 percent tuition hike.

On March 31, the Professional Staff Congress began its media blitz, airing TV ads that promote the contributions CUNY and its students make to the city's economy. This was a theme also echoed in the CUNY Day of Action on March 26. On 17 CUNY campuses, the PSC sponsored teach-ins, forums, legislative feedback opportunities or other expressions of activism. In the past few months, the union has gathered 105,000 postcards, which it delivered to Gov. Pataki on April 14th.

The union is particularly opposed to any mention of tuition increases as a possible solution to the state's deficit woes. PSC spokesperson Chris Cage cites figures the union has been sharing about the family income levels of students who attend the senior and two-year colleges. Many of them are first-generation college-goers, who work and support families while they take classes. Systemwide, she says, 16 percent have family incomes under $10,000. In the senior colleges, 58 percent come from families with an annual income less than $30,000. At the community colleges, 69 percent are at that family income level. The governor refuses to raise "job-killing taxes," as he calls them, Cage says. However, CUNY supporters call tuition increases a tax on the poor.

In testimony before the Legislature, PSC president Barbara Bowen noted that tuition increases are "an unstable base on which to fund a public university. In the 1990s, tuition was raised twice and the net result was a decline--$159 million less in total CUNY funds." [Barbara McKenna / AFT On Campus]

[May 15, 2003]