A controversial amendment to the state budget that would have cost Ohio University about $12 million per year was removed from the budget this week.
The Republican-added amendment would have tied in-state tuition rates to a public university’s decision to give out-of-state students a letter proving residency so they can vote in Ohio. It would have cost public Ohio universities a combined total of about $370 million in tuition fees, officials have estimated.
Ohio Sen. Lou Gentile, a Democrat whose Senate district includes Athens, agreed with the senate’s decision to omit the provision.
“It was an obvious decision to disenfranchise student voters and hold public universities hostage,” Gentile said. “Public universities would have lost millions of dollars, so I think the senate did the right thing.”
In the weeks since the amendment was added to the House’s version of the budget earlier this month, Democrats have said Republicans were trying to suppress a voting bloc that usually swings left by threatening universities with losing tuition.
Gentile agreed and said the state “ought to be encouraging students to participate in elections … efforts like this don’t send the right message."
Had the budget provision been passed, Ohio State University would have lost an estimated $114.8 million from out-of-state students and Miami University would have lost $78.3 million. OU’s estimated $12-million loss would have been about average compared to other public universities in the state.
Leading up to the decision to remove the amendment, OU worked with the Inter-University Council of Ohio — a coalition of public universities — to remove the amendment from House Bill 59, according to a previous Post article.
Both the university and the council declined comment on the removal of the amendment.
The House and the Senate still have to hammer out their differences in the budget before they have a bill ready for Gov. John Kasich to sign. It wasn't immediately clear if representatives in the House would put the amendment back in.
