Students, Faculty Protest Fee Hikes, Cuts : Rally: About 250 at UC Irvine urge lawmakers to stop raising state tuition and call off pay cuts, reductions in programs.

More than 250 UC Irvine students, faculty and staff members marched through the campus Friday and called on state legislators to stop fee increases, pay reductions and program cutbacks.

The crowd waved banners, blew whistles and chanted “No more fee hikes!” as they weaved through campus and finally stopped at the administration building, where speakers vented their anger.

Demonstration leaders and state Sen. Art Torres (D-Los Angeles), one of the speakers during the two-hour rally, urged the audience to contact state lawmakers.

“The fight is not going to be easy. You must take back your power,” Torres said to thunderous applause. “You must work your own strength and change the course of history. Fight so that generations that come after you will not have to rally . . . or fight against fee hikes.”

The UC Board of Regents voted in March to raise annual fees by $995, or 33%, beginning in the fall and to cut most employees’ pay by 5% for one year. The plan also called for cutting enrollment by 2,000 from the current 165,700 students and eliminating about 1,000 jobs.

But unless the University of California stops raising fees and slicing programs, protesters said, thousands of students will be forced out of school, and the quality of education will be jeopardized.

Like others, student Helaine Hatter questioned whether UCI could be called a “public education” if high tuition costs make it accessible to few.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” said Hatter, who works two jobs to pay for her schooling. “It’s just ridiculous. This isn’t a private school--it’s the University of California. It’s not USC or Stanford.”

Hatter said she will have to consider community colleges next fall.

But Gov. Pete Wilson also has proposed hiking fees at community colleges, and in Santa Ana on Thursday more than 1,500 Rancho Santiago College students protested against those plans.

UCI protest leaders pointed to that and another rally staged here last March as signs of growing dissatisfaction among students, locally and statewide, over the burgeoning costs of a higher education.

“We’ll keep going until we unify and make a stand . . . and send a message to the regents, the administration and legislators,” said Michael Solorza, 21, a UCI senior and student leader. “They’ll listen as long as we’re obnoxious. These (rallies) have made an impact.”

Acting Chancellor L. Dennis Smith was on vacation when students protested in front of the administration building.

Other community leaders, Torres and Assemblyman Tom Umberg (D-Garden Grove), however, attended the rally.

Afterward, dozens of demonstrators wrote to various elected officials statewide on pre-addressed postcards provided by protest sponsors, the Associated Students of UCI and the University Council-American Federation of Teachers.

It was one of the first times students and faculty have united to fight budget cuts, said Karen Maxson, a spokeswoman for the teachers’ group.

“This is going to affect everyone,” said Raul Fernandez, UCI professor of comparative culture. “There’s a fiscal crisis in the state of California and the government is trying to remedy that fiscal crisis on the backs of the students. There’s a lot of faculty here because they believe in the concept of ‘public education.’ ”