If the state is serious about wanting to find fertile areas for spending cuts, it ought to consider Bundy Aid — a program that gives state money to private colleges.
Bundy Aid is named for McGeorge Bundy, the national security adviser under presidents Kennedy and Johnson who was perhaps best known for advocating for the Vietnam War. Then-Gov. Rockefeller in 1967 appointed Bundy to chair a committee to look into what the state should do to support private higher education in New York. The unanimous conclusion of the committee was that the state ought to be helping fund private colleges and universities with direct financial assistance.
Beginning in 1968, the legislature did just that, appropriating $25 million that first year to 57 participating institutions. It currently totals almost $45 million a year. That is barely noticeable compared with the $2.4 billion the state spends on its public university system, but at a time when tuitions are increasing and student aid decreasing, the taxpayers shouldn't be asked to help fund private institutions too.
Such copiously funded schools as Columbia, Cornell and Syracuse University share Bundy Aid. With endowments such as theirs, can anybody make a serious argument that they are in need of state charity?
Taxpayers should be outraged that crucial programs are in jeopardy and the state has been trying gimmicks such as issuing new automobile license plates to add to an evaporating revenue stream; and those taxpayers are still being asked to supplement these endowment-rich institutions. The State Legislature adjourned for Thanksgiving last week without making any headway on the budget.
The State University of New York union, United University Professions, is taking up the fight to end Bundy Aid and turn over that money to SUNY. This is not the first time the discussion has taken place. For several years now, the matter has been debated, but the legislature has yet to make a serious effort at eliminating the expenditure.
A bill is in the Assembly, but it hasn't gotten out of committee. It hasn't even been introduced in the Senate, though UUP is looking for a Democratic sponsor who can get the bill considered. The hope is that finding a Senate sponsor could spur action in the Assembly.
No one in the state wants to see private colleges threatened with failure, but New York's private colleges are famously self-sufficient. Most are downright wealthy. Last summer's failure of the stock market, which drained endowments, has turned around.
And is it every New Yorker's duty to fund private universities anyway — particularly at the expense of their real public responsibility: SUNY?
SUNY institutions and students are imperiled by budget cuts that are eliminating programs and positions. It is very much not in the public interest to continue to help fund prosperous private universities while SUNY is suffering such massive losses.
