(Sean Whaley/Nevada News Bureau) – Among the multiple proposals identified today by Gov. Jim Gibbons to balance a state budget that is out of balance by $890 million is a hit to the Gov. Guinn Millennium Scholarship program for Nevada high school graduates.
The program, established by former Gov. Kenny Guinn and the Legislature in 1999, provides a per credit payment to qualified Nevada high school graduates who go on to college at a state institution.
Gibbons is proposing to defer a transfer from the state’s unclaimed property fund to the scholarship program to the tune of $3.8 million a year. He is also proposing to take $5 million from the scholarship fund itself in the 2010-11 fiscal year.
Steve George, a spokesman for state Treasurer Kate Marshall, who oversees the fund, said the taking of such an amount could put the program in jeopardy. Scenarios are being run on the ramifications of the proposal and will be made available in the next few days, he said.
But the taking of the $12.6 million could put the program in a deficit situation, George said.
Dan Burns, spokesman for Gibbons, said the taking of the $12.6 million won’t kill the program or eliminate the scholarship for students who are now receiving it.
“The governor doesn’t want to do anything to destroy the program,” he said. “The governor understands that education is the intellectual infrastructure of the future. But we need the program to give a little bit to keep the entire state alive. That’s the reality of the situation.”
Burns said the scholarship was never expected to last forever, and it may be time to consider means testing as a qualification so that the money only goes to those who really need it to make college affordable.
“If you look at our list, the money is coming from just about everywhere,” he said. “No area is not pitching in. The Millennium Scholarship is one of those areas.”
George said the scholarship program is expected to receive about $18 million this year and next from tobacco settlement funds, which flow to Nevada as a result of an agreement entered into between cigarette manufacturers and most states earlier this decade. The fund is then augmented with unclaimed property funds to keep it solvent, he said.
But the fund is currently paying out about $25 million a year to scholarship recipients. So the transfer of $12.6 million to help balance the state budget shortfall is a concern, he said.
“It definitely could put the program in jeopardy in the future,” George said.
Eligible students receive $40 to $80 per credit hour depending on where they attend and the level of the course. Students must maintain eligibility as determined by grade point average. The scholarship cannot be used for remedial coursework.
George said that since its inception, about 59,000 Nevada high school graduates have taken advantage of the program, with about 20,000 earning degrees at one of the campuses of the Nevada System of Higher Education.
There is millions of dollars being wasted in gov’t agencies in nevada, where are those cuts? Start sharpening your’e own pencils and picking up your’e own laundry!!
The millinium scholarship is one of the only things they SHOULD NOT CUT in education. There are all kinds of waste in schools. Start with, why do we need 2 superintendants, why do we need several vice pricipals etc. You people are not getting to the bottom of the problem which is some of these extra employees need to go!!! I know it’s hard to cut jobs with the current unemployment rates, but these are jobs that never should of been made in the first place. JUST like too big of gov’t we have too big of school adminisration!
How about starting down at the states welfare programs, about half the people who work down there don’t have a clue as to what thier doing. They all have attitudes! They make people return for little mistakes that they could correct right there at thier desks or they send them back to the end of the line. My wife has seen this in person when she took some people down there who needed help with food stamps and had no transportation or money for bus tickets. They had to make 3 separate trips down there for stupid reasons that could of been taken care of right on the spot. She said the people waiting on them were arrogant and treated them like shit. She watched as one couple was sent back to the end of the line, got another agent and she said there’s nothing wrong with your’e paperwork, what’s going on, who did you talk to??
Problem= too big to be efficient, let someone else do the work
solution= trim it down and get rid of the people who are just there to collect thier checks!!!!!
Tim Marvin has a very good point. In business, and our personal lives we always audit our own spending 1st. I would be disappointed if they add more jobs to audit unpaid taxes then lay off in other departments. They have implemented extra employee taxes, and business taxes then hired additional workers to collect them. The efficiency of state employees is most certainly questionable. State Legislators could also incur huge expenses during this special session. Many of their bloated programs could be cut temporarily. I would not like to see K-12 education targeted because it is mandatory, but an Associate Degree is not. Students could travel a few more miles to a Community College, i.e. one in every town is a luxury.
I’m Crossing my fingers that the cut will not be made on the scholarship, because I’m depending on it.
I’m a junior at a high school right now, and if they cut the millenium-what am I, along with many others in the same desperate situation, supposed to do? Sure, there are loans and scholarships, but a scholarship can only get you so far, and loans will continue to haunt our credit and finances after we graduate college.
I understand Hummel’s and Marvin’s points, but other people don’t need to go down with the budget cuts as well. Just last year, we lost five teachers at our highschool. It’s a tragedy to watch them try to find a position in some other school, let alone find a job!
We are the 50th in education for a reason, but we can fix it.
It is absurd to think that the governor is even considering making cuts from a program that encourages students who have suffered from educational shortfallings in Nevada to stay in Nevada. With this sort of ignorance in our state’s government, no right-minded high school student would ever choose to go to a Nevada college or stay in Nevada at all. Governor Gibbons is incompetent and oblivious to the dire situation our state faces. We NEED a good educational system to build us back up from the pile of ashes we have become, and the Millennium Scholarship is one element that we can’t afford to lose.