Thursday, February 24, 2000
Patton scolds N.Ky. legislators
Message: Unite on funding
BY PATRICK CROWLEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
FRANKFORT — In comments seen as a rebuke as well as a challenge, Gov. Paul Patton said Wednesday that Northern Kentucky lawmakers must be united or risk losing additional money for higher education in the region.
Mr. Patton's comments came during a meeting with Northern Kentucky University regents and officials who had come to the state Capitol to lobby lawmakers for an increase in NKU's funding.
“Northern Kentucky and your legislative delegation are very, very important players,” Mr. Patton said, “and I would hope that they would be in a position to support some kind of a common approach to this revenue situation.”
Mr. Patton had proposed additional spending for NKU in his latest budget plan. But Mr. Patton was forced to kill it because most lawmakers wouldn't support the tax increases he had proposed. Now he is working on another budget proposal, and he pledged try to keep the funding increase for NKU in the budget.
But Mr. Patton said the financial situation facing the state is tight.
“Some (lawmakers) are getting close to the abyss, they are beginning to see how deep it is and I think they are not trying to jump off,” he said.
The NKU officials came to Frankfort on Wednesday to hear Mr. Patton and to lobby local lawmakers and key legislators, such as House Speaker Jody Richards, D-Bowling Green, and House Budget Committee Chairman Harry Moberly, D-Richmond.
Some Northern Kentucky lawmakers have gained an unflattering reputation in Frankfort of standing in the way of projects and funding designed to benefit Northern Kentucky. Celebrated political battles over funding for the Northern Kentucky Convention Center,
the Juvenile Justice Center in Newport and NKU's Science Center helped build the perception that many Northern Kentucky caucus members are obstructionists.
“We need support out of Northern Kentucky,” Mr. Patton said.
“It gets very, very frustrating to people down here when the legislature appropriates funds for Northern Kentucky and then practically everybody in the Northern Kentucky delegation is against it, to be blunt, and then shows up at groundbreakings to try and take credit for it.”
But Sen. Katie Stine, R-Fort Thomas, chairwoman of the Northern Kentucky Legislative Caucus, said the caucus is behind the funding increase for NKU.
“We support that, and the governor knows we do,” Mrs. Stine said, “because we sent him a letter saying students at Northern deserve to be treated as well as students from other parts of the state. We need to do what's fair.”
After Mr. Patton's comments, the NKU contingent fanned out across the Capitol and into the adjacent Capitol annex office building where lawmakers have their private offices.
“The funding we are seeking is a matter of equity and fairness,” said NKU President Dr. James Votruba. “But this is also a political process. We realize that, and frankly that's why we are here.”
NKU's top financial priority is a $7.2 million increase in its “benchmark” funding, the money it receives every two years from the state.
In addition, it is asking for:
• $12 million for a new power plant.
• $1 million to renovate the existing science building, which will contain classrooms when construction on the new $38 million science building is complete.
• $700,000 to begin a regional workers' training center for businesses. It will be called the Metropolitan Education Training Center.
• $4.9 million in other funding.
All that spending has been included in the state's Council on Post-
secondary Education's budget, which must be approved by the General Assembly. NKU officials circulated a flier among lawmakers that read: “Please don't let the (council)'s pro posed budget unravel. The stakes are too high and Kentucky has too much to lose.”
Dr. Votruba said NKU has trailed other universities in state funding increases.
Since 1988, NKU has received an average increase of 7.4 percent every two years, he said, which is less than Eastern Kentucky University (10.9 percent), Morehead State University (9.4 percent), Murray State University (8.1 percent), the University of Kentucky (10.2 percent), the University of Louisville (8.5 percent) and Western Kentucky University (9.2 percent.)
“We're not even close,” Dr. Votruba said.
But some lawmakers from other parts of the state say NKU is already receiving too much of an increase this year.
“Certainly we do have divergent interests at work here,” Mr. Patton said, “and whether or not we can work within our divergent interests and still work toward the common good has yet to be proven.”
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