COLUMBUS — Now that lawmakers have lifted college tuition caps and flat-lined higher education funding over the next two years, several of the state's four-year universities said they likely will raise tuition by more than the former 6 percent limit.

        “The state isn't increasing it's share, and that places the burden on campuses to find money,” Rich Petrick, the Ohio Board of Regents' vice chancellor for finance, said Friday.

        The Legislature imposed the tuition caps in 1990 as a way to control increasing college costs. House and Senate lawmakers abolished the caps in their version of the 2002-2003 budget.

        Gov. Bob Taft had opposed removing the caps — except for Ohio State University — but did not veto the measure when he signed the budget Wednesday.

        Colleges and universities, Mr. Petrick said, are experiencing rising health-care and utility expenses, as well as increasing pressure to be technologically advanced and recruit the best teachers and students.

        “To do all that, they're forced to cut services or raise tuition,” he said.

        Ohio State had asked the state earlier this year to exempt it from the 6 percent limit so that it could try to become a top national research institution. Ohio State intends to increase its tuition 9 percent. The University of Toledo is considering the same.

        UT spokesman Joe Brennan said the school is concerned about the impact of the tuition increase on prospective students.

        “We don't want to have to raise tuition, but we feel we have no other choice,” he said.

        Bowling Green State University is considering an increase of 8 percent and Miami University, which has the highest tuition in the state for four-year public schools, is considering an increase of 6 to 8 percent.

        Bowling Green spokeswoman Teri Sharp and Miami spokeswoman Holly Wissing both said their trustees will meet this month to make final decisions about raising tuition.

        The University of Cincinnati has kept increases below the cap for more than a decade.

        But spokesman Greg Hand said a “perfectly flat” state subsidy for the school for the next two years will force a tuition hike of more than 6 percent.

        The school has already cut its budget $8 million, so “the only factor in our budget that has any flex room right now is tuition,” he said.

        Kent State University and Wright State University intend to stick with 6 percent increases.

        Other schools, including the University of Akron, Ohio University and Cleveland State University, still are deciding.

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