Texas Lawmaker: Iraqi War Vets Should Be Treated Like Royalty
by Jim Brown
August 24, 2005
(AgapePress) - A Texas community college that told a decorated Marine that he did not qualify as a Texas resident any more because of the time he spent serving in Iraq has changed its mind. When Carl Basham tried to enroll in Austin Community College, officials told him he would have to pay about $2,600 a semester in tuition -- instead of about $500 a semester, which Texas residents pay. Basham, who did two tours of duty in Iraq, is registered to vote in Texas, has a Texas driver's license, and does his banking in the Lone Star State. But officials told that is not enough to qualify him for in-state tuition, that he spent too much time out of the state during his military tours to the Middle East.
After a major public outcry, Austin Community College has now granted the Iraqi war veteran in-state tuition. State Representative Suzanna Hupp has begun a probe to find out why Basham was initially denied.
"We're having to investigate, quite frankly," the state lawmaker shares. "At this point in time, it appears to me that the Higher Education Coordinating Board has not gotten the word out to all of its people about a bill that we passed the last session." That measure ensured that spouses and dependents of active duty military personnel were eligible for in-state tuition.
Evidently word has not filtered eastward from Austin to College Station, where it is reported that Texas A&M University has been forcing active duty military members from Texas to pay higher tuition rates. That report did not sit well with Hupp.
"As a legislator who represents a large part of Fort Hood, Texas, I'll be darned if anybody's going to mess with my folks that are over there with bullets flying over of their heads," Hupp offers. "When they come back here, I want them taken care of as if they were royalty. I want their families taken care of as if they were royalty."
Hupp says when push comes to shove, the Legislature controls the purse strings of the state's colleges and universities -- and it needs to make it clear how military members are to be treated.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
