Thread: Ruling on tuition fees to be appealed

Ruling on tuition fees to be appealed
By Aurelio Rojas - Bee Capitol Bureau

Published 2:58 pm PDT Wednesday, October 11, 2006


A Yolo County judge's ruling upholding a California law that allows public colleges and universities to extend resident fees to illegal immigrants will be appealed, lawyers for the plaintiffs said Wednesday.

"We fully intend to appeal," said Kris Kobach, an attorney for the Immigration Reform Law Institute, adding the challenge will be filed within the next few weeks in the 3rd District Court of Appeal in Sacramento.

The class action lawsuit was filed last December on behalf of out-of-state students who claimed that giving certain undocumented immigrants an in-state tuition break discriminated against legal U.S. residents who are charged a higher tuition.

The plaintiffs argued the California law violates, among other matters, federal immigration reform legislation passed in 1996.

But Superior Court Judge Thomas Warriner concluded last week that the challenge to Assembly Bill 540, which the Legislature approved in 2001, lacked legal merit.

"There has been no showing that Congress intended the Immigration and Naturalization Act or any other federal statute cited by the plaintiffs to occupy the field of determining resident tuition rates at state universities and community colleges," Warriner wrote in his decision.

Robert Rubin, legal director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights in San Francisco, argued the law does not violate federal law because tuition benefits are not restricted to illegal immigrants.

All a prospective student has to prove is that they are California high school graduates who have spent at least three years in a high school in the state.

"This important decision insured the rights of all longstanding residents of California, including undocumented immigrants, to afford a state college or university tuition," Rubin said.

But Kobach said "this is really just the first stage of a multi-stage lawsuit."

About the writer:

* The Bee's Aurelio Rojas can be reached at (916) 326-5545 or arojas@sacbee.com

http://www.sacbee.com/101/story/37825.html

"This important decision insured the rights of all longstanding residents of California, including undocumented immigrants, to afford a state college or university tuition," Rubin said.

Legal residents you mean.

Illegal or not, students get in-state rate
Argument that California law giving tuition break to undocumented is discriminatory is rejected.
By The Associated Press

WOODLAND -- A judge has upheld a state law allowing public colleges and universities to charge in-state fees to undocumented immigrants.

The law had been challenged by a class-action lawsuit filed last December on behalf of out-of-state students who claimed the tuition break discriminated against U.S. citizens.

Out-of-state students pay higher rates than California residents in the state's three-tiered higher education system -- the University of California, the California State University and California community colleges. In the past, immigrants who didn't have legal status as California residents faced out-of-state rates.

But a 2001 law allows nonresidents to pay in-state fees if they attended a California high school for at least three years and graduated from a California high school.

Immigrants who are in the state illegally who apply for the tuition break must certify they are in the process of getting documentation or will do so as soon as they are eligible.

Among other things, plaintiffs in the lawsuit argued the law violates federal immigration reform legislation passed in 1996.

But Superior Court Judge Thomas Warriner ruled last week there was no indication Congress intended the Immigration and Naturalization Act or any other federal statute cited by the plaintiffs to determine resident tuition rates at state universities and community colleges.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs said they will appeal the ruling.

http://www.dailybreeze.com/news/regstat ... 80426.html