Page and pages of docket info here for a telephonic meeting on Friday. The UO students have voted against this several times, a fact which is conveniently not mentioned in the proposal. Costs have increased from $300 per student per year to $351 – payment starts before construction finishes – and approval will be conditional on a positive vote from the students this fall, which new ASUO Pres Laura Hinman believes she can deliver. To put this in perspective, these fees will be about 4x what the students currently pay in subsidies for the athlete only Jock Box tutoring.
One tidbit from the financial projections: OUS has no idea that our enrollment is supposed to hit 25,200 this fall – they think it’s going to level out at 24,000 next year. How much are we paying Dr. Pernsteiner? When did Matt Donegan say he was going to hold a board meeting at UO? 8/15/2012.
The public finance aspects of this are novel, to say the least. Two fundamental principles are
a) finance public projects based on who benefits, or
b) finance them based on who has the ability to pay.
This financing scheme manages to go against both principles simultaneously. Current students will bear the cost of losing use of the ERB during construction, and they will also be expected to pay for a building that won’t be completed until they graduate.
And the fee is regressive per student head tax, not based on income.
Not to say UO wouldn’t be better off with a bigger EMU, just that this is a poor way to pay for it. Were any alternative financing approaches considered? Like borrow more money and delay the student fees until they will be paid by students using the building?