A troubling aspect of SUNY's tuition increase the next three semesters is that SUNY might not get the money.

The $310 per student that will be added to tuition each of the spring and fall 2009 and spring 2010 semesters could just go into the general fund for spending anywhere the legislature decides. Meanwhile, $210 million has been cut from the funds SUNY has available to educate our students. Does anybody think that makes any sense?

We all know, and we've said in this space, that the state is in big financial trouble and we all need to sacrifice. We continue to believe that in deadly earnest.

But SUNY is sacrificing by $210 million in the short term and then being obliged to stand by while the state adds to the student burden and gobbles up the proceeds. SUNY is left with less money, probably fewer students and the monumental task of trying to compete with institutions better enabled to direct their own destiny.

This kind of dealing with SUNY is symptomatic of the overly intrusive controls with which the State Legislature has historically shackled the university system. While few would advocate that the government simply turn over assets to any of its components, with no accountability demanded, the degree to which the legislature imposes itself into SUNY affairs thwarts creativity and squanders opportunity.

For example, SUNY and its colleges are not allowed to lease space to community organizations without legislative approval. This could be a significant revenue producer, but it is forbidden. Nor can SUNY or its colleges enter partnerships on their own within their communities, such as for retirement communities, student housing or food service, to name a few possibilities. Nor can they exploit opportunities for use of their own land for energy production or other useful, educational or potentially remunerative results.

In short, SUNY should be trusted to look after more of its own functions without having to extricate itself from so much red tape. It confounds logic to delay the nation's largest university system while it awaits word from a legislature that has been called the nation's least efficient.

But of all the controls imposed by the legislature, the seizure of new tuition revenue stands out as perhaps the most unfair. While SUNY agrees with the need for an increase to maintain the quality of education, the prospect of seeing every dollar diverted into the general fund must be the ultimate frustration.

SUNY has had one tuition increase in the past 13 years, a $950-a-year increase in 2003. That was intended to make up for a loss of state support, so it was not a gain for SUNY. SUNY has asked for permission to institute tuition increases based on the Higher Education Price Index, which would specify for students and prospective students exactly how much they'd pay during their entire stay at college. That is far more sensible than surprising everyone with an increase — and then turning all the proceeds over to the legislature to spend.