Regents Committee Expected to Urge $550 Fee Increase : Education: The UC system is looking for ways to offset a $225-million shortfall. A decision on the hunt for a 10th campus site also is expected.

A group of University of California students on Thursday denounced proposals to increase student fees and cut enrollment, asking the Board of Regents to trim administrative fat from its budget instead.

A committee of the regents, meeting in San Francisco, was expected to recommend Thursday a $550-per-student annual fee increase and $1,000 hikes for selected graduate students.

The nine-campus UC system must offset a $225-million shortfall caused by the state’s bare-bones budget.

Regents’ committees were also expected to recommend whether to continue with plans to add a 10th campus.

In morning sessions, the grounds and buildings committee recommended designs for new research and cancer treatment buildings at the UCSF-Mt. Zion medical center in downtown San Francisco.

Mayor Frank Jordan spoke in favor of the expansion, but several neighborhood groups said it would increase congestion and pollution in their vicinity.

About 60 students attended the regents’ morning session, sitting with fists raised, but they left the meeting when told that the committee deliberating on the fee hikes would not meet until the afternoon.

At a news conference outside, student leaders said the budget shortfall could be met by asking each faculty member to teach an additional class a year, by deferring faculty salary increases, and by eliminating the positions of vice presidents and vice chancellors.

“That’s where the money is going,” said University of California Student Assn. President Tobin Freid.

The regents already were expected to consider a plan to cut 2,000 administrative and non-instruction jobs in the next several years.

The university said the work force cuts accounted for two-thirds of planned budget reductions. The remainder would come through student fee increases and cuts in library and equipment purchases.

Undergraduate in-state student fees would increase 18% to $3,594 a year. It would be the third major fee increase in three years.

The increase would cost students an additional $400 a year, plus another $150 a year for five years to repay a proposed $70 million loan to help the university through this fiscal year. Without the loan, university officials say they would have to impose a midyear fee increase.

After lunch, a regents committee was to recommend whether to continue with plans for a 10th campus despite the budget crunch.

Sites in Fresno, Merced and Madera counties are being considered, although a site selection task force last month recommended dropping Madera County from consideration.

Some regents were reportedly concerned about the next step in the new campus process, which would be to commission $1.5 million in environmental impact reports.