150 Students Stage Noisy Protest : Education: Upset over impending fee hike, demonstrators march on UC regents meeting in Irvine. They say increase will keep away low-income students.

More than 150 chanting students, upset over an impending 40% fee hike, marched on the University of California regents meeting here Thursday, shouting that the increase will keep out low-income students and turn the UC system into a bastion for the wealthy.

“This is supposed to be a public institution,” shouted one student, drowning out the comments of several regents who emerged from the UC Irvine student center to meet with demonstrators.

“Not one just for the richies,” shouted another.

The noon demonstration was the largest organized opposition yet to the more than $650-a-year fee increase approved by the Board of Regents in February, and signaled the increasingly angry mood of students as they prepare to register for the fall quarter.

Regents who ventured outside the meeting chambers to speak with demonstrators made it clear that the fee hike was a tough decision for them. But they said the governor’s proposal to slash $295 million from the UC budget in the coming year left them little choice. Gov. Pete Wilson himself had proposed a 20% fee increase at both UC and California State University campuses this fall. Several demonstrators, however, accused regents of “balancing the budget on the backs of students.”

The fee increase, which takes effect in the fall, is the largest single jump in the 123-history of the UC system. At UCI, the actual increase is $729 a year, and means undergraduates now will pay $2,524.50 a year, excluding room and board. Graduate students will also be hit with a $118 increase in health insurance premiums, raising fees next year to $3,010.50.

UC officials and regents have defended the increase, saying that a University of California education still is far less expensive than many public universities elsewhere in the nation. To blunt the acknowledged impact on poor and lower-middle-class students, however, UC President David P. Gardner has pledged extra financial aid.

“What you are objecting to, we understand,” Regent William T. Bagley told the placard-waving crowd of students. “The real answer is about 400 miles away in Sacramento,” added the former state assemblyman from San Francisco.

Bagley, speaking through a megaphone, was frequently drowned out in mid-sentence by shouting students. He pointed out that fees were not the only impact of budget cuts. He noted that an early retirement program was robbing students of some of the best and most senior professors, as well as senior staff members.

Fees are high, Bagley conceded, especially when compared to the $35 he paid as a student at UC Berkeley in 1945. “But those of you who will now need aid because of the increase will get it,” he said. “The ones who will be paying, if you will, are the rich.”

In response, students began chanting: “Don’t believe the hype!”

Jeannie Verdone, a junior majoring in social sciences, told the crowd that she and her mother recently talked about how they would cope with the increased cost to attend UCI. “I’m going to be taking 20 units a quarter so I can get out of here in four years,” the 20-year-old from Newport Beach said.

Regent Martha Newkirk, a UCI graduate from Laguna Beach whose voting term as alumni representative ends next month, stepped to the megaphone and told the crowd: “We are really sensitive to the concerns that you raise. This is what the regents are dealing with now.”

She explained in an interview that regents are girding for even greater cuts in state funding now that the projected state budget deficit is expected to hit $13 billion, almost double earlier estimates. She said it was doubtful that regents would raise the fees even higher. By the same token, regents are unlikely to rescind the fee increase as students were demanding.

“We’re dealing in the most difficult times the regents have ever had,” Newkirk said. “There’s absolutely a legitimate concern among students. And there was a great deal of Angst among regents before they voted on the fees. There were phone calls back and forth for days before the meeting.”

What convinced them was the financial aid package proposed by the UC president. “The thinking was that with the generous financial aid package, the truly needy and moderately needy will not be denied access,” Newkirk said.

However, many students predict the money set aside for financial aid will not be enough. Moreover, many who are now eligible for assistance did not learn of the new rules until the application deadline passed a few weeks ago, said Susan Polan, a UCI graduate student and president of the statewide UC Student Assn.

Polan conceded that regents were unlikely to roll back the fees, but students are hoping to persuade legislators throughout the state to amend the state budget to require the regents to hold any fee increase to 10%.

A second part of their strategy is to win assurance that this 40% hike will be a one-time surcharge for the 1991-92 school year only, Polan said.

For Polan personally, the higher costs mean she will have to take a leave of absence during the winter and spring quarters next year while she tries to complete her dissertation.

“I can’t afford it,” she said.

Diana Darnell, who will become the student representative on the Board of Regents July 1, praised students for their concern and encouraged them to take their message to legislators in Sacramento.

“They need to hear over and over again how stressed we are in education,” said Darnell, a Ph.D. candidate at UC San Francisco. “Thanks for coming. Be loud and rowdy!”