Associated Press
4-13-06

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) Lawmakers have decided how to spend 95 (M) million dollars in federal hurricane recovery aid for Louisiana's colleges and universities after earlier disagreements with higher education officials over distribution of the money.

The money will provide emergency student financial aid and will be used to bolster funding to public and private colleges affected by hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The dollars can be spent over the next two years.

In February, lawmakers complained they didn't understand the distribution plans presented by Commissioner of Higher Education Joseph Savoie and questioned why some campuses with greater damage from Hurricane Katrina stood to receive fewer dollars than campuses with less damage.

Savoie and the Board of Regents, which governs higher education, worked with the legislative staff to come up with a more palatable spending plan for lawmakers. The final piece of the plan was approved by the Legislature's joint budget committee today.

Of the dollars, 8-point-5 (M) million will cover student financial assistance, doled out to both public and private colleges to provide grants of up to one thousand dollars to students who were affected by the hurricanes and have struggled to return to school since the storms. The program will be administered through the state's Office of Student Financial Assistance.

Under the final plans, the rest of the money will be allocated to the following schools:

-- 14 million each to Tulane University and the University of New Orleans.

-- 12.2 million to Delgado Community College.

-- 8.2 million to Loyola University in New Orleans.

-- 6.9 million to Xavier University.

-- 6.5 million to LSU's and Tulane's financially struggling medical training programs.

-- 5.6 million to Southern University at New Orleans.

-- 5.3 million to Dillard University.

-- 3.7 million to Nunez Community College.

-- 2.6 million to McNeese State University.

-- 2.1 million to two theology schools in New Orleans.

Other dollars will be split among the state's technical college campuses, Our Lady of Holy Cross College and Sowela Technical Community College.