By Patrick Crowley
The Cincinnati Enquirer

HIGHLAND HEIGHTS - Fourteen years ago, political differences, regional bias and years of inattention cost Northern Kentucky University state funding for an arena that eventually went to Murray State in western Kentucky.

Today, NKU may finally be getting some respect in Franfort with Gov. Ernie's Fletcher's plans for a $43 million arena. The governor also wants to spend $5 million to begin closing the funding gap between NKU and other state universities.

It's about time, NKU backers say.

The 14,000-student school has spent much of its 36-year existence at the end of the line when it comes to time, attention, money and resources from Frankfort, Enquirer research shows. NKU trails the other schools, as well as Kentucky's community college and technical school system, in every major benchmark - from annual funding to the number of buildings on each campus.

"This governor gets it," said Senate President Pro Tem Dick Roeding of Lakeside Park, who, like Fletcher, is a Republican. "It was a Republican governor (Louie Nunn) who provided leadership and funding to start NKU, and it's a Republican governor who is finally recognizing that NKU has been at the bottom of the list in Frankfort for too long."

In the two-year, $15 billion budget Fletcher has proposed, he has included nearly $370 million in borrowed money to build major projects on every state-run college campus in Kentucky.

Kentucky's two largest universities - the University of Kentucky in Lexington and The University of Louisville - are considered statewide research universities and received $13,303 and $10,205, respectively, last year for each full-time equivalent student.

The other state-funded schools are considered regional universities. For the 2002-2003 school year those five schools - NKU, Western Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky, Morehead and Murray State - received a median allocation of $5,215 for each full-time student.

NKU received $3,796, lowest in the state.

President Dr. James Votruba, who came to NKU six years ago from Michigan State University, said Fletcher recognizes that investing in NKU will help Northern Kentucky's economy grow through a better-educated work force.

Votrubaacknowledges that politics and the strong support Fletcher received in Northern Kentucky during last year's gubernatorial race is helping NKU grab momentum - and dollars.

"It's both political and economical," Votruba said. "NKU is not funded at this point to have the capacity that this region needs from us in order to continue to grow.

"But it doesn't hurt to give the governor 70 percent of the vote up here ... and $800,000 in private (campaign) funds," he said.

Votruba said the arena alone would have a regional economic impact of $4 million a year.

The 10,000-seat special events arena still needs to make it through the General Assembly. Fletcher's budget still has to go before the House and Senate budget committees. Then there will be full votes in the Republican-controlled Senate and Democratic-held House.

If the project is rejected, NKU would continue to be the only state-funded university without an arena. And Northern Kentucky would also lose out on a facility that would provide a place for concerts, sporting events and more.

Some don't like it

Lawmakers from in and around Louisville, the state's largest metropolitan area, are opposed to Fletcher's spending plan. They not only want more for their region, but question the project.

In a recent Senate floor speech, Louisville Democrat Sen. Tim Shaughnessy said the state should not be funding a "basketball arena" while facing a $1 billion deficit.

Because of previous state budget cuts and the deficit, NKU and most other state-supported universities are weighing tuition increases as high as 20 percent this fall. Though operating and building funds come from separate sources, NKU has taken some heat for pursuing money for an arena when tuition is about to increase.

Votruba points out that NKU would prefer an increase in its annual state funding allotment.

In terms of construction, the university's priority is new classrooms, he said. "But if they are going to give us an arena, we'll take it."

Sheree Davis, 17, a freshman elementary education major from Fort Mitchell, fears that without additional state funding the quality of education at NKU may suffer.

One reason she says she chose NKU was because of its reputation for small class sizes and the personal attention students receive.

Russell Proctor has been a communications professor at NKU since 1991. In that time, he has seen the number of speech communications majors leap from 40 to 230. Yet only one or two full-time faculty members have been added.

"Students are regularly getting closed out and we're not talking about freshmen and sophomores," Proctor said. "We're talking about juniors and seniors who need these classes.''

Even when it was being planned in the 1960s, NKU suffered because existing universities in the state didn't want to lose students to a new university.

Funding lags

NKU continues to lag the other universities because it "has not been in existence as long as the others," said House Majority Caucus Chairman Jim Callahan, D-Wilder, whose House district includes NKU.

Yet the lack of a unified political front often hampers NKU in Frankfort, Callahan said.

In 1990, for instance, only he and one other legislator from Northern Kentucky - Marty Sheehan, now a Kenton district judge - supported Gov. Wallace Wilkinson's controversial and expensive Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA), a radical overhaul of the state's public education system that required a $1 billion tax increase.

"NKU was going to get $10 million for an arena back then," Callahan said. "But when the majority of our lawmakers failed to get on board with KERA, Wilkinson took that $10 million and sent it down to Murray State for their new arena."

Votruba said that, while political battles may have been a detriment in the past, he is convinced those days are over.

"Our (legislative) caucus has had a tough time getting together, but today our caucus is stronger and more unified today than I've ever seen," Votruba said.

Callahan and other lawmakers said Votruba has made a huge difference in Frankfort. His skill at political maneuvering and lobbying is helping NKU achieve the equity it has long deserved, Callahan said.

"I have said to the leadership in this region a number of times that this is a wonderful community but we're too polite," Votruba said. "We celebrate the scraps. And I think we are seeing a change in that regard."

Enquirer reporter Kristina Goetz contributed. E-mail pcrowley@enquirer.com and kgoetz@enquirer.com