Melissa Fox For Assembly

The solution to UC Irvine's budget crisis begins in Sacramento. For too long, our representatives in Sacramento have ignored the interests of UC Irvine, its students, staff and faculty.

UC Irvine is the most prestigious institution of higher learning in Orange County. It is also the County’s third largest employer –  the largest in the District – and the primary engine spurring local economic growth, development, and innovation. Cutting funding for UC Irvine will have a potentially devastating impact on the economic wellbeing of our community.

The massive tuition increase across the UC system began with the mismanagement of California’s budget priorities in Sacramento – and will not be changed until voters elect more representatives who understand the critical importance of California’s public universities and colleges to the economic and social well being of our state.

Who is affected by the UC budget crisis and fee increases?

The students, of course, are immediately affected, and many of them will either be unable to continue their education or forced to incur tremendous debt.

The families of students are also directly affected, as well as the families of any child in California who might aspire to become a student at one of California’s public universities and colleges.

California’s businesses are also affected, since there is there a direct connection between California's economic prosperity and the educational level of its workforce.

In fact, we are all affected by this massive tuition increase, which is a direct attack on California’s middle class and threatens the economic future of our state.

As the wife of a college teacher who received his Masters and Ph.D. from UC Irvine, Melissa knows the crucial role of UC Irvine in creating jobs, stimulating local business growth, and ensuring a brighter future for Orange County and California.  For that reason, Melissa supports an oil severance fee (California is the only state which does not have a fee for oil extraction, and only place in the world which receives neither tax nor royalty revenue from its oil resources) that would raise $1 billion for our public universities and community colleges.

As a member of the legislature, Melissa will fight to realign California’s budget priorities so that our state universities and colleges remain among the best in the world, so that middle class families are not shut out of our state’s higher educational system, and so that our state can regain its national standing as a leader in business and scientific innovation and economic opportunity.

Our community colleges are crucial gateways to success and prosperity for millions of Californians.

More than any other institution, our community colleges provide the educational opportunities necessary for millions of working and middle class Californians, including adults and returning veterans, to achieve the California Dream. 

In fact, three-quarters of California’s more than 20,000 Iraq and Afghanistan War veterans who are attending college are enrolled in a community college. 

The devastating cuts to California’s community colleges imposed by the state budget have come at exactly the wrong time – when unemployment is rising, veterans are returning home from deployment, and more people are seeking the educational opportunities and workforce training necessary for success in the 21st century. 

As a member of the Assembly, Melissa will fight to improve our community colleges as they work to provide educational and workforce training programs to millions of students.