Central State University supporters fear that a compromise plan to rescue the school could end up killing it instead.

Even some of the school's trustees believe the legislative plan - scheduled for a final decision by the end of June - is designed to cause Central State to cave in on itself, saving Ohio's legislators and other state officials the political fallout from a direct decision to shut down the state's only historically Black, public university.

Dr. George Ayers, the consultant heading up a temporary management team, said the legislative plan's restrictions, coupled with a new round of budget cuts that threaten additional layoffs at the school, are "putting a rope around the neck of the institution."

Central State (CSU) has been fighting for its political and financial life for several months, after a ballooning debt prompted efforts by some Republican members of the Ohio General Assembly to remove all state funding for the school. Some legislators had floated the prospect of merging CSU with another university, such as the private Wilberforce University - which gave birth to, and sits across the street from, Central State - or the much larger Ohio State University. But the merger talk has faded, and members of the Ohio legislature now have devised a very different plan that they say could restore CSU's health, but which has the possibility of closing the school altogether.

Legislators have amended the state's budget bill to include $28 million in funding to keep the school open for the next two years. But they have also attached more than two dozen restrictions and conditions to that funding, requiring Central State to reduce its academic programs, faculty, and athletics, and to pay off an accumulated debt, estimated to be at least $8.6 million, within its existing budget. The school would have to mothball its powerful football program - which was already under sanction by the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) - and raise its private fund-raising totals and admissions standards while reducing student attrition and loan-default rates. It also would be prohibited from using state funds to provide grants or scholarships to out-of-state students.

If the school fails to meet any one of the conditions, the state's Board of Regents would take steps to close the school.

Legislators presented the proposal to CSU's board of trustees in late May as the best and only compromise that would allow the school to remain open. Trustees criticized the restrictions, saying they amounted to punishment of current trustees and students who had nothing to do with the prior mismanagement that led to CSU's problems. However, the board voted four to one to accept the provisions.

Trustee Member Mervyn Alphonso, who abstained from the vote, said later that he felt the package of provisions appeared to be designed to set the university up for failure. He also said that he interpreted the restrictions as an attempt by legislators and other state officials to shift responsibility for that likely failure to a board of trustees that has taken several steps over the last ten months to correct Central State's problems.

Dr. Julian Earls, a trustee who was serving as chair of a search committee that was looking for a new president for CSU, cast the lone vote against acceptance of the provisions. On May 31, he stunned his fellow board members by announcing his resignation.

According to Earls, "Certain conditions could not have been drafted better by fools or racists - or both. I don't tolerate either."

Earls, deputy director for operations at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Lewis Research Center in Cleveland, singled out for criticism "restrictions on funding intercollegiate sports activities from private funds." He called the restriction "punitive to the highest degree."

At the meeting where Earls announced his resignation, he said, "I don't accept being punished by those who contributed to the problem I have been asked to solve."

Earls was one of the nine trustees brought in en masse by Ohio Gov. George Voinovich last August. Voinovich forced out the previous trustees.

Earls's departure may not be the only protest resignation from the board. Alphonso, president of a banking operation in the Dayton, Ohio, area, said he will wait to see the CSU language of the final state budget before deciding whether he too will step down.

The provisions were written in part by State Sen. Eugene Watts (R-Columbus), a long-time critic of state spending on CSU who has lobbied for its closure. Watts said the restrictions are "absolutely necessary for Central State to survive. Without these changes, I'm afraid we'd be throwing a frayed rope to a drowning man."

The provisions drew a chilly response, however, from the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights (OCR), which had reopened a sixteen-year-old investigation into its 1981 finding that Ohio violated federal civil-rights laws in its funding and treatment of CSU. OCR officials have said that the state must enhance CSU's programs, making them more attractive to students of all races, in order to resolve the case.

"It is sad that Ohio and Mississippi would remain in company as the two states failing to address the mishappenings within their states histories," said Raymond Pierce, OCR deputy assistant secretary.

"If the state of Ohio moves to address the crisis at Central State by punishing the institution - the victim - in the form of constrictions, that will only make the school less attractive to prospective students. Such actions cannot be viewed by the federal government as part of any plan to remedy the damage done to [Central State] students as a result of neglect and the shameful disregard of tragedies carried out over the years."

In response to Pierce's comments, Watts said, "We're not concerned with what he says anyway.... If we did not believe that what we did would hold up in court, we would have closed the school."

But news of the proposed restrictions, coupled with the absence of an ironclad assurance that the school will exist after July 1, has sabotaged student recruitment and retention efforts and forced the suspension of the presidential search - key components to Central State's survival.

"This has put us in a terrible situation," said Board of Trustees Chairman Fred Ransier, a CSU alumnus. University officials were scrambling to figure out ways to cut $5 million from their budget in part because enrollment projections for next fall were reduced even further - from 1,600 to 1,200 students. The school had nearly 2,000 students last fall.

Ayers, who has essentially served as acting president during the entire school year, said he abhors the prospect of more staff cuts to a school that has lost more than 20 percent of its workforce through thirty-five layoffs and thirty-four retirements this school year.

"I don't think you can cut much more," Ayers said. "We're at the bone."

Of particular concern to both Ayers and Ransier is the legislative provision that requires CSU to gain reaccreditation by the next school year to remain open. Further cuts in faculty, staff, and academic programs will likely make that task difficult.

Robert Marcus, president of CSU's chapter of the American Association of University Professors, said the university must complete "a delicate balancing act" to retain adequate faculty to gain reaccreditation.

Faculty members will offer ideas on how to save money in the school's existing budget, but realize some personnel cuts will be necessary, Marcus said.

"We'll try to ensure (the cuts) are done in a fair way," he said. "We're going to work for the survival of the institution."

There are a few encouraging signs for the school. Although admissions as of late May were running 73 percent below last fall - 350 compared to 1,303 - the academic quality was high. Approximately 40 percent of the incoming freshmen had grade point averages of 3.0 or better.

"I don't believe there is an urban university with an open-enrollment policy in the state that can match that," Trustee Paul Dutton said.

State Sen. Jeffrey Johnson (D-Cleveland) has held meetings with faculty and students to assure them that the proposed conditions can be met. He said that he believes that the Board of Regents would develop a due-process procedure that would put CSU on notice and give the school time to correct any deficiency, rather than moving to immediately close the school. And some trustees were still holding out hope that the conditions could be eased in the final budget bill due on the governor's desk by July 1.

As the June 15 commencement approached, though, the mood on the campus was glum.

Valencia Williams, Central State's student-government president, said she hopes recent events will amount to a "call to action" for students and alumni. She issued a challenge to those who want to punish students for misdeeds of prior administrations.

"In the future, I hope those who are not supporters of this school will come to Central State and visit the campus," said Williams, "just to realize it's not just buildings, but lives."

RELATED ARTICLE: Proposed conditions, currently before the Ohio legislature, that CSU would have to meet in order to remain open.

The Board of Trustees shall:

* File quarterly reports on annualized budget, comparing budget to actual spending with projected expenses for the remainder of the year.

* Place all residence hall and meal fees in a rotary account dedicated to the upkeep anti maintenance of the dormitory building and to fund meal programs.

* Place monies for the operation of residence hall and meal programs in separately maintained auxiliary funds in the university accounting system.

* File the minutes from Board of Trustees meetings with the Board of Regents within thirty days of meeting.

* Submit a plan to the Ohio Board of Regents for phasing out all academic programs that cannot reasonably be contained within either the university's College of Business, College of Education, or College of Arts and Sciences.

* Reduce the number of faculty to a level needed to support the programs of the university's College of Business, College of Education, or College of Arts and Sciences.

* Not enter into any collective bargaining agreement until after July 1, 1997.

No state university in a state of fiscal exigency [which includes Central State University] shall:

* Use state funds for the purpose of providing grants or scholarships to out-of-state students.

* Use state funds to subsidize off-campus housing or transportation to and from off-campus students.

Central State University shall:

* Raise admission standards for freshmen entering after July 1, 1998.

* Reduce its student attrition rate to a level agreed upon by the state's Board of Regents and the university's Board of Trustees.

* Gain reaccreditation from the north Central Accrediting Agency.

* Seek funds to rebuild the endowment fund to a level that at least meets fund level targets appropriate for institutions of comparable size.

* Implement a system of alumni donations that at least meets donation targets appropriate for institutions of comparable size.

* Reduce its default rate for student loans.

* Not expend any private or public funds for sponsorship of, or participation in, intercollegiate sports activities [football and baseball] for which the university is under sanction as of July 1, 1997, by the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics.

* Reduce expenditures for all other intercollegiate sports activities to a maximum of the fiscal year 1997 expenditure levels for those activities.

* The Director of budget and Management shall maintain a financial supervisor at CSU to monitor adherence to the Fiscal Recovery Plan. Within ten days after the end of each month, CSU shall prepare a payables report delineating by fund and vendor all outstanding payables owed by the university. A comparative analysis by month shall be presented with the rationale provided for the variances reflected for changes from the previous month.

It is the intent of the General Assembly that if CSU fails to comply with any requirement, the Board of regents shall thereupon develop and implement a plan for the closure of the university.

Mark Fisher is the higher-education reporter for the Dayton Daily News.