Shelbie Harris
News Editor
Before the establishment of a stable government, guns, outcasts and lawlessness characterized the Wild, Wild West. Though unlawfulness no longer defines Idaho and the modern western frontier, firearms and foreigners are still the talk of the town more than 150 years later.
Idaho Senators, cloaked in the shadow of the recently passed constitutional carry bill, swiftly voted on and passed Senate Bill 1280 (S1280). Effective July 1, 2016, the bill amends residency definitions and provisions for students of Idaho public institutions of higher education.
“Everybody has this thing with immigrants right now, and the Republican Party put that [bill] in strictly to prevent foreign students from becoming Idaho residents,” said Idaho Sen. Roy Lacey, who is a Democrat for District 29.
“They don’t look at other consequences and it’s terrible, it should not be in there. It’s going to affect a lot of Americans and possibly Idahoans who have moved away and came back.”
Legislation states those coming to Idaho can establish residency if they are physically located in the state, primarily for purposes other than educational intent, and can show satisfactory proof they have no designations for establishing domicile in another state.
Furthermore, the law presumes a student enrolled more than eight hours in any term during a one-year period is in Idaho for educational purposes and this period does not count toward becoming a resident.
“If you’re going to school and working, you’re here for education,” Lacey said, adding, “you didn’t come here for work you came here for education and that’s the way it’s always read. If they were getting around it before, that’s amazing.”
Language in the law supports Idaho residency classification as long as students can prove to the institution they moved to the state for reasons other than education.
“It used to be referred to as the one-in-three or the five-in-seven,” said Scott Scholes, the Idaho State University associate vice president for enrollment management. “The philosophical theory behind the law has been if people are coming here to go to school, and that’s their primary purpose then they shouldn’t gain residency. But the mechanism which determined that is this legislation.”
According to the current statute, “Such period of enrollment shall not be counted toward the establishment of a bona fide domicile in this state unless the student proves, in fact, establishment of a bona fide domicile in this state primarily for purposes other than educational.”
This clause gave out-of-state students the ability to meet certain conditions for one year, which would qualify them for residency and in-state tuition prices. Current legislation is comprised of two individual factors, the first with three qualifiers and the second with seven.
The law provides a framework for institutions to determine residency as long as, for a 12-month period, a student filed their income taxes, was working full-time or owned a home. They also had to prove three of the following: vehicle registration, voter registration, the ownership of an Idaho driver’s license, evidence of the previous domicile’s abandonment, having the presence of household goods in Idaho, the establishment of an Idaho bank account and any other similar factor that could prove intent being the seventh option.
S1280 removes all language relative to the one-in-three or the five-in-seven stipulations, and condenses the bill so that institutions have a concrete structure in which administrators can better serve their students.
“The filter is going to be created at a legislative level and our job as an institution, and specifically the registrar’s office, is to apply it equitably,” Scholes said. “I’m concerned with honoring the State Board (SBOE) and honoring the law, while also doing what’s best for our students.”
For two years, the SBOE worked closely with several institutional constituency groups from each of the state’s public postsecondary institutions when developing these changes to the residency statute. These groups included registrars, legal counsel, and provosts, vice presidents for finance and administration, and government affairs representatives. Intended to simplify residency determination, the statutory changes should allow more students with significant ties to Idaho to qualify for Idaho residency for tuition purposes.
Blake Youde, the chief communications and legislative affairs officer for the SBOE said the bill’s intent was to streamline residency determinations. The bill emphasizes students who completed at least six years of elementary and secondary education in Idaho and matriculated at an Idaho institution within six years after graduating from high school – under current legislation, these students would not qualify for residency.
“This bill will give students time to do military service, mission work or attend undergraduate school out of the state and come back for graduate school,” he said.
Since Gov. Otter’s signing of the bill on March 22, many student organizations including ISU’s Physician Assistant (PA) program and the University of Idaho’s Law program have voiced their concerns.
One individual is Colorado native, Marc Manko. Also an ISU PA graduate student, vice president of the physicians assistant student society and president of the 2017 class, Manko presented his concerns about the bill to the ASISU Senate during their weekly meeting on March 30, where he said one of the contributing factors regarding his decision to come to Idaho State was the current rules on residency and in-state tuition. He said this new bill could affect more than half of the 72 people enrolled in his program.
Additionally, Manko said the registrar’s office introduced him to the residency provisions and explained the process. His concern is that the new law goes into effect July 1, but school didn’t begin last year until August, which wouldn’t quite give him, and others in his situation, a full 12 months of sufficient proof for residency requirements.
“When people come to school a lot are looking at options of what this is going to cost me and where am I going to go,” he said. “Our program did not directly tell us that you can complete the steps to qualify for in-state residency. But really, when you talk to the registrar and they talk to you in the language that once you prove you have intent to move to the state and you qualify for this next year, you can then assume you’re going to get in-state tuition, which is $20,000.”
According to Youde, Some individuals expressed concern to the State Board that program administrators and registrar officials were directing and encouraging students to attend Idaho institutions indicating that after a year they would qualify for in-state tuition. Both Youde and Scholes believe institutions were not intentionally deceiving students and were merely interpreting the law as it currently reads.
“We’ve issued a guidance memo to institutions because we didn’t even know this was happening and there was no intent for a ‘bait or switch’ or anything else,” Youde said. “The whole purpose was to make it crystal clear to students and families that if you graduate from a high school in Idaho you get resident rate tuition. If you attend six of your years of elementary and secondary education but move somewhere else and graduate, we still want you back and you’ll pay in-state tuition because kids don’t choose where they live.”
