A scaled-back free tuition plan?

PROVIDENCE — With the days ticking down on this year’s regular session of the General Assembly, Gov. Gina Raimondo has intensified her campaign to win approval of her proposal to provide free tuition for Rhode Island students at the state’s three public colleges.

But in an interview with The Providence Journal on Wednesday afternoon, Raimondo acknowledged projected revenue shortfalls and said she is open to revising the initial scope.

“The budget is tighter than we had hoped, so we have to be realistic,” the governor said. “I’m open to compromise and starting smaller and scaling it back, but I think it would be a huge mistake not to do something.”

Raimondo’s latest effort to win passage of the Rhode Island Promise Scholarship program includes a video and fresh statements of support from the Rhode Island AFLCIO and the Rhode Island State Council of Churches.

“We see this program as a major impetus in opening post-high-school opportunities for all of Rhode Island’s students,” said the Rev. Donald Anderson, executive minister of the council. “This is an investment in Rhode Island’s future that we must make. Not providing these expanded educational opportunities will only further hinder a Rhode Island economy where all can benefit.”

“The Rhode Island AFL-CIO and working families across Rhode Island strongly support the Rhode Island Promise scholarship proposal and respectfully requests the General Assembly to pass it,” said Rhode Island AFL-CIO president George Nee. “The Rhode Island Promise scholarship proposal is a priority for working families because it will make Rhode Island workers more competitive.”

But Cranston Mayor Allan Fung, who strongly criticized the proposal when it was first proposed, renewed his opposition Wednesday.

“I opposed Governor Raimondo’s taxpayer-funded college tuition program when it was first introduced. I stand more so now in opposition because of the state’s projected structural budget deficit and the lack of resources for our K-12 schools,” Fung told The Journal. “Now is not the time to launch new spending programs when our fiscal house is in disorder and our public schools need more support.”

House Speaker Nicholas A. Mattiello has shown no enthusiasm for the program — and the governor’s latest pitch appears not to have swayed him.

“With $134 million less in resources available for the budget, Speaker Mattiello does not believe it is the time to create new government programs,” Larry Berman, the speaker’s spokesman, told The Journal on Wednesday. “All proposals are still being reviewed by the House Finance Committee.”

The latest official estimates indicate that revenues are running tens of millions of dollars behind expectations for the fiscal year that ends on June 30, and tens of millions more for the fiscal year that begins July

1. When The Journal asked Mattiello earlier this month if that means the free-tuition proposal is dead, he said: “It’s probably unrealistic to think of that right now.”

Under the proposal, juniors and seniors in good academic standing at the University of Rhode Island and Rhode Island College would be eligible for free tuition and have mandatory fees waived. Students entering the Community College of Rhode Island after graduating from high school would be eligible for two years of free tuition and have mandatory fees waived.

The program would be phased in over several years, and, as originally proposed, would cost $10 million in fiscal 2018 with a projected annual cost of $30 million in 2021. Room and board would not be covered for students living on the URI and RIC campuses.

Since announcing her proposal in January, the governor has brought her campaign to schools, municipal forums, the Make It in R.I. summit and other venues. She has appeared before the Senate and House Finance Committees, and won the support of students, educators, and several legislators and mayors. The presidents of URI, RIC and CCRI have endorsed the plan.

On Wednesday, the governor outlined what compromise might resemble.

“Different ideas are floating around,” she said. “Means-testing for example, like they did in New York.”

Signed into law last month by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, New York state’s Excelsior Scholarship program is offered to students from families with an income of no greater than $100,000 starting this fall, rising to $125,000 in 2019. There is no family income restriction in Rhode Island under Raimondo’s initial proposal.

“That cuts down the cost considerably and I could be open to something like that,” Raimondo said. “There are different ways to reduce the cost which I am open to. I want to do something — this isn’t an all-or-nothing. It’s much better to do something than nothing. Start the project, set us down the path. In future years if there’s more money, expand it.”