PHOENIX ÷ Two members of the Senate Education Committee balked at Regents' proposals yesterday to increase resident undergraduate tuition by up to $1,000.

Sen. Thayer Verschoor (R-Mesa area), said he was concerned that raising tuition could mean a number of students won't be able to afford enrolling at UA.

"Are they just, as you said, going to have to bite the bullet · and deal with this huge increase? You're talking about a pretty significant increase," he said.

Assistant Minority Leader Sen. Linda Aguirre (D-southern Phoenix) said she was concerned that an increase could make tuition unaffordable for students in the lower or middle income bracket who are barely making ends meet but earning slightly too much to qualify for financial aid.

"Minority communities panic when you talk about tax hikes," Aguirre said.

Though the Regents have plans to set aside 14 percent of tuition to meet the needs of students dependent upon financial aid, which is up from the 8 percent currently withheld, no one answered questions from Verschoor and Aguirre about how the universities planned to bridge the gap between those in-state students who have just enough income not to be eligible for financial aid and would struggle with a tuition hike.

Though the education committee does not set tuition at UA, a job which is reserved for the Arizona Board of Regents, the Arizona Legislature could alter UA's budget in response if there were a strong enough sentiment against a tuition increase, as then-governor Jane Dee Hull once proposed she would do.

The committee asked President Pete Likins, Arizona Board of Regents President Jack Jewett, and the presidents of Arizona State University and Northern Arizona University to explain plans to cut, merge and launch new programs at the three universities, raise tuition and massively restructure the universities under the Changing Directions plan.

When the Regents meet to set tuition in April, Jewett said they will pass a "substantial tuition hike," for in-state undergraduate tuition which could mean local students will pay $500 to $1,000 more next year.

The Regents' ultimate goal is to increase UA's in-state tuition so that it comes close to what the 35th least-expensive large public university charges, Jewett said. Right now UA's tuition is the cheapest in the nation, and it would take about $1,100 to bring UA up to where Jewett is projecting it should be.

Students shouldn't think of their loans as debt, but as an investment toward their future, NAU president John Haeger said.

Graduate, out-of-state and professional students should pay tuition based on the going market rate and the cost of the program, ASU President Michael Crow said.

Jewett made a plea to the legislature, which is in the middle of severe budget deficit, to fund the universities more when financial times are better.

"The state of Arizona really has not contributed much to financial aid · quite frankly, we cannot move forward and complete the tasks that we want to complete without some program from the state for financial aid."

Likins said the tuition increase and Focused Excellence were a necessity in a state where public funding for higher education is down, on a per taxpayer or per student basis, from what it was 30 years ago.

Though the overall funding from the state has grown, the portion of UA's revenue that comes from the state has decreased from 45 percent to 34 percent in the past 15 years.

"We didn't just get into this mess. We've spent the last 30 years experiencing a withdrawal of state support, without any substantial growth in tuition rates," Likins said. "There has been a more dramatic decline in state support for higher education in Arizona that anywhere else in America."