UC Fee Hikes OKd, Again

University of California regents voted Thursday to raise undergraduate student fees by 8% and graduate fees by 10% for 2005-06, the fourth consecutive school year that UC students will have faced such higher costs.

The decision to raise fees was expected as part of a long-term budget agreement that UC and the California State University system signed with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in the spring in an effort to stabilize their funding after several years of deep budget cuts.

However, despite the long anticipation of the fee hike, students inside and outside the regents’ meeting room at UCLA protested it. About two dozen peeled off T-shirts worn over their clothing at one point, symbolically giving the university “the shirts off our backs.”

With the latest increase, total fees for California resident undergraduates at UC will have risen 79% between 2001-02 and the coming school year.

The board voted 13 to 1 to raise the mandatory systemwide fees for California resident undergraduates by $457, to $6,141. With additional charges required by individual campuses, the average total fees for in-state undergraduates will rise to $6,769, not including housing and other costs.

With those included, the overall expense for a UCLA undergraduate next year is likely to exceed $22,000.

California resident graduate students, meanwhile, will pay $628 more in mandatory systemwide fees next year, bringing their total average fees to $6,897.

Out-of-state students will face a 5% hike, and professional school students will pay about 3% more.

The decision drew a sole “no” vote, from student Regent Jodi L. Anderson. Regent David Lee abstained.

Cal State trustees recently approved their own increases, bringing average fees for undergraduates to $3,102 and for graduate students to $3,684.

Officials with both state university systems have defended the agreement with the governor -- and the fee increases -- as necessary to begin repairing the damage from several years of lean budgets and funding cuts to research, libraries and maintenance.

The higher costs to students “are painful,” UC President Robert C. Dynes acknowledged. “But we’re in a delicate balancing act. Students want to come to the University of California because of its quality, but that’s been eroding. These are difficult times.”

UC officials also pointed out that, despite the latest increases, the fees charged to in-state undergraduate and graduate students at the university remain below those of comparable public institutions in other states. The average undergraduate fees next year for the University of Michigan, the University of Illinois, the State University of New York and the University of Virginia are expected to be $7,781, which is $1,640 more than UC.

Administrators also said the neediest UC students would not feel the increase because about 25% of the new fee revenue would be rolled back into financial aid. The percentage returned to financial aid will be up from last year’s 20% but down from the 33% figure of previous years.

Many students attending the meeting said the steadily rising costs are threatening their ability to stay in school.

“It’s becoming harder and harder for many of us,” said Christopher Sweeten, 20, a third-year student majoring in ethnic studies at UC San Diego. Sweeten, of Los Angeles, said he works three jobs to try to make ends meet, in addition to carrying a full load of classes.

Andrea Luquetta, 29, a third-year law student at UCLA, said the spiraling fees may force her to give up her dream of practicing public-interest law; the relatively low-paying field might not yield enough income to allow her to repay her student loans, she said.

When the increases were approved, the students in the meeting room rose, took off cream-colored T-shirts worn over their clothes and tossed the shirts toward the regents. Earlier, the group had marched in a circle, carrying signs and chanting objections to the fee hikes.

Several regents expressed sympathy with the students’ views, but said they had no choice. “None of the regents enjoy raising student fees,” Chairman Gerald Parsky said. “It’s a very difficult thing to do.”

The fee increase was part of a $2.83-billion budget proposal approved Thursday. That was the university’s request for funding from the state in the coming year. UC’s board sets the fees, but the Legislature approves the overall budget for the university each year, including the revenue from student fees.

The proposal represents a hike of about 4% from the current state-funded budget of $2.72 billion. The plan includes money for a small increase in enrollment university-wide and a 3% pool for faculty and staff salary boosts. The raises are critical for the university to avoid slipping even further behind the salaries at its comparison institutions, UC officials said.

Times staff writer Stuart Silverstein contributed to this report.