The Budget Crisis and Its Effects on UCLA

As many UCLA students today realize, the budget crisis has been an everlasting issue at our school. However, its origins can be traced back to the mid to late 60’s and early 70’s when Reagan served as the governor of California. Staunchly conservative, Reagan refused to reform a bill known as Proposition 13 in his early years as governor (the bill outlined the rules for supplying local governments with funding for higher education). As his term as governor progressed, the California UC system became threatened by these budget cuts. Furthermore, many students at UCLA felt increasing angst towards Reagan because of their liberal and reform beliefs. To many of the emergent New Left groups of the later 60’s, Reagan represented a staunch enemy of conservatism, and a great deal of this sentiment was experienced by UCLA students in the early 1970’s.

 

A 1972 Daily Bruin article written by staff writer Dave McNary captures this general disapproval of Reagan’s policies felt by the general bruin public. During 1972, many professors even felt disappointment in Reagan’s policies as McNary points out that faculty payroll had “dropped from 30th in the country to 58th.” Many graduate students were also severely affected by the budget cuts as registrar information indicates that the percentage of graduate students had declined from 28.2% to 23.8% during this year.

One of the tactics Reagan employed as part of his budget cut program was to close more classrooms at UCLA. Chancellor Charles E. Young, or “Chuck” Young as Mr. Sandbrook referred to him fervently disagreed with Reagan on this matter. In one article from the March issue of a 1972 Daily Bruin, Young described the situation with passionate and angry words:

“It says [referring to Reagan’s policies] some damn stupid things…The University is not an undergraduate school, this is something that the state director and of finance and the governor have not understood. Maybe someday they’ll learn it.”