ustxtxb_obs_1974_02_15_50_00007-00000_000.pdf

commission members Dr. Peter Flawn heated debate and much controversy over the fund in the commission, but an anecdote making the rounds suggests the future of the fund. It is said that a certain scholar on constitutional processes came to Texas to confer with the CRC and wound up having lunch with a certain Frank Erwin, a member of the UT Board of Regents. The two debated genteelly for a while, arguing over the merits of a “pure” constitution versus a “political” one. At length, Mr. Erwin declared himself an unshakable partisan of retaining the constitutional appropriation of the Permanent Fund. The scholar doubted the advisability of including such a picayune provision in the fundamental charter of government. The regent thereupon turned reddern’ a boiled crayfish and said that he by God had the clout to do it and the Permanent Fund would by God be in the constitution. IF ANYONE remained to be convinced that Frank Erwin and the University of Texas have the clout and that the Permanent Fund is well on its way to its second century in the Texas Constitution, Erwin’s appearance before the Education Committee of the convention should have convinced him. On a day which featured, as the numerous witnesses testified, a rare show of unanimity among colleges, universities and The University, Regent Frank testified in favor of retaining the dedication of the fund and in favor of retaining some other constitutional guarantee of funding for the rest of the state’s higher education system. \(At present, such a guarantee is provided by the statewide ad valorem tax contained in the constitution: most administrators who appeared advocated a doubling of the rate for that tax from 1 ost per $100 valuation to 2 oct Erwin rehearsed for the committee a brief history of the fund and of The University, up to and including the necessity for the institution to absorb an enrollment increase of 15,000 between 1964 and 1970 \(“that’s twice as many students as Yale University has accumulated in over 200 years, and we were required to accommodate ourselves to necessity for it to issue bonds, guaranteed by the Permanent Fund, student building use fees and student tuition, to finance continued growth. After six pages of this, he dropped his first argument on the committee: “In order to fund the building program mentioned above, the Board of Regents has committed portions of the Available Fund up through the year 2003.” In other words, there’s only going to be about $8 million left to spread around in the next biennium anyway; why bother to split it up among all the colleges in the state? Erwin’s major argument, though, was that The University is a university of the first water only because of the Permanent Fund, that it represents an educational resource that the delegates should not throw away lightly. In presenting his case, Erwin added a new wrinkle to the line UT partisans have taken throughout the revision process. He disavowed any claims that The University offers any better freshman English courses than, say, East Texas State University. “The thing that distinguishes U.T. Austin from the other state colleges and universities,” quoth Erwin, ‘ “is the same thing that brings it national and international recognition and that is the breadth and excellence of its graduate and research programs and that is also the area to which the enrichment afforded by the Available Fund is primarily devoted.” The regent mentioned UT’s library, its plasma physics research, its Latin American institute, its’ observatory, its Navy-sponsored sonar research and other worthy research enterprises. He did not mention its Satanic studies collection, nor its locks of Byron’s and Shelley’s hair, but the message was clear. ERWIN GOT a generally warm reception from the committee. He brought with him other UT notables, including Chancellor Mickey LeMaistre, UT Austin President Steven Spurr and UT Regent Lady Bird Johnson \(Johnson received a standing ovation when shewas Austin delivered himself of several minutes of fulsome praise shortly after Chairman February 15, 1974 7 132370 919.00 water softener, McDonald 131832 Observatory 142412 135.00 refrigerator for UT System 111083 airplane operations 42646 204.74 camera, close-up lens, right angle finder, film developer for Office of the Dean of Education 109848 146478 332.10 security shredder and stand for Office of the Comp 98453 178.35 “electric wastebasket” 58105 59208 155.96 4 “polygaurd riot shield [s] , 340355 convex” \(two each for UTEP 132368 3,765.00 1973 Plymouth Fury III sedan \(less $1,150 trade-in allow 28873 ance, for net $2,615 expend 124868 113156 78.02 12 rolls EH126-20 Ekta chrome high speed film and 25 packs type 107 Polaroid film for security police 130669 49.85 135876 47871 989.53 18 manhole covers 01601 128571 94.00 for Bauer House: 24 glass dessert bowls 41170 white lotus bowl, with 100.00 Kentia palm tree for Bauer House 7.90 for Bauer House: two cake pans, teflon-lined, 9″ 576.00 “Billy goat vacuum cleaner, model BG-60P, with riding Bauer House 95.88 12 18” clayflower pots for Bauer House 346.50 labor and materials \(from Heard’s Custom Draperies, for Bauer House 528.72 water and light bills \(for telephone bill \(for Aug., system, UT-Austin \(includes $30,158.81 long distance maintaining permanent records of students and ex-students of UT part of $25,000-per-year contract with investment a advisory service firm, Lionel D. Edie Co., Inc. professional services rendered in production of 16-mm. sound and color film, “Causes and Prevention of Blowouts” 85,283.43 4,360.87 5,000.00 3,000.00