College students plead for — and get — added fee

Friday, Oct. 22, 1999 | 11:08 a.m.

The moment was fraught with irony.

Representatives of the state's approximately 100,000 college students on Thursday pleaded with the state Board of Regents to make them pay more to attend classes, while the regents appeared deadlocked on whether they were willing to take the drastic step of adding a $4 per credit hour technical fee.

"If you don't want to listen to our voices, why are we here?" Ginger Davidson, president of the Graduate Student Association at University of Nevada, Reno, asked the regents as they argued the issue.

Ultimately, the regents voted 9-1 in favor of adding the fee that will become effective next semester and raise $8.3 million during the remainder of the biennium for the replacement of computers and other technology-oriented equipment.

Jennifer Peck, student body president at UNLV, said the students on her campus didn't like the idea of paying a fee to make up for the technology funds cut from the higher education system budget by the Legislature this year, but they were willing to do it because they realize it is for their good.

UNLV student Brian Alvarez, who seemed to express the feelings of most of the students who crowded into the regents meeting, said he agreed with the student body presidents from all the colleges and universities who spoke in favor of the fee.

"We're entering a new century," he said. "It is important that we are on the cutting edge of technology."

Regent Steve Sisolak was the staunchest opponent of the fee, and the sole vote against it in the end.

"I'm in favor of technology -- it's the fee I'm opposed to," Sisolak said.

Regent Howard Rosenberg seemed poised to vote against the fee and supported a sunset clause that would have automatically ended the extra cost when the Legislature adds the technology funding back into the budget.

"I don't like to put it on the back of the kids," Rosenberg said.

UNLV President Carol Harter and UNR President Joe Crowley opposed the sunset clause because it would make it difficult to hire people to run the technology that will be bought by the fee.

Regent Tom Kirkpatrick also opposed the fee.

"You can call the fee anything you want, but it is a tuition increase," he said.

The regents crammed a lot of business into the first day of their two-day meeting, being held in the student union on the UNLV campus. During the session, they:

The students, who organized a protest on campus Wednesday, presented Harter with the same letter before the start of the regents meeting Thursday.

Harter said a list of demands in the letter, which included the addition of more students to a campus police advisory board, were not unreasonable and that she will be meeting with the students in the future to discuss their concerns and take whatever steps are necessary.

Joey Cohn, founder of the UNLV chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said students were satisfied with Harter's response and looked forward to working with her on the police issue, but he said the students were not going to let up on their campaign against the police.

"We are optimistic that Dr. Harter and the administration will work with us to resolve the campus police misconduct and other issues. We speak in spirit of cooperation. We don't want the regents to have to deal with it," Cohn said.