|
|
| |
| Fri, Nov. 21, 2008 |  |
 |
|
||
| |
Immigration advocate OK with tuition edict Saturday, May 24, 2008 By Rob Moritz Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - The chairman of an advocacy group that opposes punitive laws targeting immigrants in Arkansas said Friday he has no problem with requiring state colleges and universities to make sure only legal Arkansans pay in-state tuition. State Higher Education Director Jim Purcell advised the schools this week to add questions of residency and U.S. citizenship on admissions forms, and to require a Social Security number or student visa number. At the direction of Gov. Mike Beebe, Purcell sent letters advising higher education institution officials that non-compliance could mean loss of state funding. "It's certainly federal law as well as state law, and it really it a little beyond the scope of what we're concerned about," said the Rev. Steve Copley, chairman of the Arkansas Friendship Coalition, a group of civic, clergy and business leaders opposed to state and local government anti-illegal immigration laws. Also Friday, former state Rep. Joyce Elliott said she is considering reviving a bill she filed in 2005 to authorize state higher education institutions to offer in-state tuition to children of illegal immigrants when she returns to the Legislature next year. "These kids are residents, and when people are residents we allow them to have in-state tuition," Elliott said. In his letter to state college presidents and chancellors, Purcell said any state school that offers in-state tuition to illegal immigrants and does not make the same offer to any U.S. citizen who lives out-of-state is violating federal law. The department said schools should take steps "in a good faith effort to comply with federal law." University of Arkansas and the University of Central Arkansas had been offering students in-state if they had official transcripts from a state high school. The schools were not checking to see if the students had Social Security numbers. Since receiving the letter, officials at both schools have said they plan to make sure students are legal citizens of the state before they are offered in-state tuition. Elliott a former three-term House member from Little Rock, defeated incumbent state Sen. Irma Hunter Brown, D-Little Rock, in Tuesday's Democratic primary. She has no Republican opponent in the November general election. In her final session in the House in 2005, Elliott sponsored legislation that originally would have allowed children of illegal immigrants who graduated from an Arkansas high school to be eligible for state scholarships. The measure was supported by then-Gov. Mike Huckabee. An amended version, to allow the children of undocumented immigrants to pay in-state tuition, passed the House but was narrowly defeated in the Senate. Elliott said she may resurrect the measure for the 2009 regular session. "It will depend on the tenor of the Legislature, their comfort level," she said Friday, adding that several legislators who supported the measure in 2005 "were treated quite brutally" back home after the measure failed. |
