Governor urges lawmakers not to cut funds to universities and colleges

Democrat Governor Tom Vilsack’s urging republican legislators not to cut the budgets of the state universities and community colleges. Lawmakers and the Governor must either make 120-million dollars worth of cuts in the state budget, or — as the Governor suggests — dip into the state’s economic emergency fund. Vilsack says the universities can’t raise tuition or lay-off faculty who’re in the middle of spring semester. The operating budgets for Iowa, Iowa State and U-N-I have already been cut over 10 percent. Republican lawmakers cut the Legislature’s budget by two-point-six percent last week, but Vilsack says lawmakers haven’t cut their own budget enough.Vilsack suggests G-O-P lawmakers shouldn’t congratulate themselves too much on cutting their own budget, since the Legislature’s own budget is bigger this year than it was two years ago, while every state agency but public safety and corrections has a smaller budget than it did in 2000.