Regents reign in spending at UT

Houston Chronicle:

As the spring semester wound down, the University of Texas System felt compelled Thursday to respond to rumors that UT-Austin President William C. Powerswas facing a crucial pass-fail exam of his own.

The rumor was prompted by a blog posting Wednesday from Paul Burka, senior executive editor at Texas Monthly. Citing an unnamed source, Burka wrote that the UT System Board of Regents was unhappy with Powers for expressing disappointment with the board's decision to disapprove his request for a tuition increase.

"This action inevitably will affect our ability to teach our students and make new discoveries," Powers wrote in a report to the UT community.

In his Wednesday blog, Burka reported that Board of Regents Chairman Gene Powell asked UT System Chancellor Francisco G. Cigarroa to officially recommend that the board fire Powers and that Cigarroa refused.

"The chairman of the Board of Regents has never directed me to fire anyone," Cigarroa said in a statement released Thursday.

Gov. Rick Perry's office kept its distance from the rumor but voiced no clear support for Powers.

"The governor has had no involvement in this," said Catherine Frazier, spokeswoman for Perry. "It's no secret that President Powers favors raising tuition. The governor does not."

... 

Even though the State and the Permanent University Fund supply substantial money to the University of Texas System, the administration has continued to drive up cost by pushing more of the faculty and staff into the one percent.  One of the results is that students have had to take out more student loans to feed this monster at a time when graduates are not finding jobs that can help them pay for the loans.  They are then left to sit on their parents couches or drift into a mode of serfdom that makes it difficult to set up new households which means the economy is not growing.

I agree with Gov. Perry that we need to reign in the spending at colleges and universities so that students and their parents can afford the expense of attending.

There are supposed to be some smart people in these institutions.  They need to find a way to do their job without driving up the cost to the point that it is not affordable.  They also need to quit whining when the regents say no.  That is not professional and the hysteria created by the Burka Blog post is not a credit to those involved.