A Northern Michigan University sign is pictured. (Journal file photo)

By CHRISTIE BLECK

Journal Staff Writer

MARQUETTE — Northern Michigan University stands to benefit from the recently signed Michigan budget that reinstates the full reimbursement funding to Native Americans attending universities in the state as part of the Michigan Indian Tuition Waiver.

Gavin Leach, NMU vice president for finance and administration and NMU Board of Trustees treasurer, said the state of Michigan House Fiscal Agency shows the differences between the funding received for Indian Tuition Waivers in fiscal year 2018-19 and the actual cost to the school of the waiver.

In NMU’s case, it had been in a deficit position in appropriation funding for tuition waivers of over $600,000, Leach said, and that was the case for many years.

In the fiscal year 2019-20 appropriation bill, the state increased NMU funding to $1.1 million to cover the actual cost of the waiver, Leach said, which was included as part of the overall 1.9% appropriation increase NMU received this year.

Enacted in 1976 and amended in 1978, Act 174 of 1976 provides free tuition for state resident North American Indians in Michigan public universities and community colleges as well as certain federal tribally controlled community colleges.

The tuition waiver served as a legislated solution to the 1934 Comstock Agreement, which pledged free education for Michigan Native Americans in exchange for the land swap at the Mount Pleasant Indian Industrial Boarding School.

This agreement was negotiated by the U.S. Department of Interior and memorialized by an Act of Congress in 1934 that same year.

In the early 1990s, then-Gov. John Engler threatened through several fiscal cycles to veto the appropriations for the tuition waiver program.

The Michigan Legislature in 1998 added the waiver to the base budget for Michigan universities but froze the appropriations at 1998 levels. Despite efforts throughout the years for supplemental increases, appropriations remained the same, which resulted in universities being under-reimbursed for tuition they waived to honor the legislation.

“We had a gap that had grown significantly over the years,” Leach said.

Any school that had Native American students fell further and further behind in what it was reimbursed, Leach noted.

“It’s gone from a reimbursement to a flat appropriation to now,” Leach said. “They’re adding an element in the budget for helping bring us closer to equal on what we should get reimbursed.

“It was recognizing they’d been behind on it, and then they’re trying to make up for just on an annual basis. It doesn’t make up for all the years we were behind.”

Jason Nicholas, director of institutional research and analysis, said that for fall 2019, 94 students on campus identify themselves as Native American. This represents 1.2% of the overall NMU total head count, which is 7,732.

Christie Bleck can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 250. Her email address is cbleck@miningjournal.net.