Axing Kerr and Taxing

The dismissal of Clark Kerr as president of the University of California was a rude rebuff to an excellent administrator. In eight years, he helped build the university into the strongest public university in the country. His departure solves nothing, for no reputable successor is likely to agree to replace him until many Californians, particularly Governor Reagan, outgrow their belief that the state can have an excellent educational system and not collect taxes for it.

The issue which divided Kerr and Reagan was the governor's plan to cut the university's budget by ten per cent in a general state-wide economy program designed to prevent a tax increase. The Governor and many of the people who elected him want to cut the university and state college appropriation. Yet they want to accommodate an additional 10,000 students--the products of California's population boom--and still maintain the quality of faculties and equipment.

The Governor has suggested collecting $400 tuition per student to fill the gap between what Reagan's budget can provide for and what those 10,000 extra students will need. But by his own figuring this will make up only part of the difference. The deficit will be even wider if Reagan fulfills his promise to award scholarships to all students who can't meet the tuition.

Some state leaders have promised that out-of-state applicants be charged more or even be excluded from the state colleges and university to make room for the rising number of California applicants. But this would restrict the university's ability to perform an important function--attracting talented and educated manpower into the state. Freezing faculty salaries or spending all of the regents' special contingency fund would be equally ill-advised.

The only hope is to raise taxes. California ranks 12th among Western states in the percentage of per capita income its citizens pay to support state colleges and universities. The California legislature has the last word on the cuts in the University budget, and they should force their constituents to look at the question more carefully.

The 1966 elections and Kerr's dismissal show that many Californians entertain a lazy suburban hope that property taxes will stay down while salaries go up and everyone's children enjoy public education. It won't work, and firing a recalcitrant university president won't make it work.