Ehrlich Budget Boosts U-Md.

Funding Increase Is Political Move, Democrats Say

Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. yesterday proposed boosting state funding for Maryland's university system by $117 million next year, offering a 14.5 percent increase to a system in which he had cut spending earlier in his tenure.

The announcement drew praise from university officials, including Chancellor William E. Kirwan, who credited Ehrlich (R) for making an "extraordinary investment" that Kirwan predicted would be the largest percentage increase in higher education funding in the nation.

But Ehrlich's morning news conference, held at the flagship campus in College Park, was derided by Democratic leaders as an election-year ploy. And the governor, they said, did too little to address escalating tuition at the system's 13 institutions that came, in part, because of $120 million in cuts that Ehrlich made in past years.

"He essentially pushed the university system under the bus, and now he wants credit for driving them to the emergency room," said Sen. Brian E. Frosh (D-Montgomery).

Tuition bills have risen by more than 40 percent since 2002 at some university campuses, including College Park. University regents plan to set this fall's rates Friday, but the budget Ehrlich proposed assumes additional increases of up to 4.5 percent.

The nearly $926 million included for the university system was the largest item in Ehrlich's fiscal 2007 higher education proposal, which calls for an overall increase of $172 million.

Funding increases were also included for the state's community colleges and historically black institutions, and Ehrlich proposed a 28 percent increase in funding for need-based financial aid -- which he said will have doubled since his arrival in office in 2003.

During an interview, the governor took aim at Democratic lawmakers who criticized cuts he made to higher education during his first two years in office.

The cuts were part of a broader effort to address a fiscal shortfall Ehrlich faced. In response, the university system reduced programs and raised tuition to some of the highest levels in the country for state schools.

"The same people who spent us blind are the ones who are complaining," Ehrlich said of the Democratic lawmakers. "Our first year was just getting through. We didn't have any money."

Ehrlich's subsequent budgets included relatively modest increases for the university system.

Ehrlich said that next year's more substantial increase made good on a pledge to university leaders to boost funding if they could show they could run the system more efficiently.