A 30 percent fee hike - the second increase since December - will almost certainly be imposed for California State University students this week, but even with a fee deadline coming at the end of this month Chico State University's chief financial officer says there is no need to panic.

Wednesday the CSU board of trustees, meeting in Long Beach, is expected to hike the so-called "state fee" for full-time undergraduate students. The semester fee will go from $786 to $1,023, a hike of $237 a semester.

The fee hike is part of the CSU's response to the anticipated cuts in state funding for the 23-campus university system, which includes Chico State.

This fee hike will be imposed when the vast majority of CSU students are away for the summer and not particularly paying attention to changes in the university fees, but it is also taking place just over two weeks before the fee payment deadline for the fall semester at Chico State.

Officially anyone failing to have their fees paid by July 31 will face an additional $25 late payment fee.

"It's not any different than we had last winter," explained Chico State Vice President for Business and Finance Dennis Graham.

Last December, in the middle of winter break, again a time when students are not thinking about school fees, the CSU board of trustees voted in a 10 percent fee hike for undergraduate students and a 15 percent boost for graduate students.

"The invoices had already gone out and everything had been calculated," said Graham.

He said Chico State was able to make the adjustments without any great pain.

"The most important thing for us to do, for the students to do, is not to panic, or for anybody not to panic," said Graham.

Once the trustees have approved the hike, Chico State will have to recalculate the invoices that go out to all of the enrolled students.

Part of the problem, when it comes to figuring the bills, is adjustments for financial aid.

According to the trustees' agenda, the 30 percent fee hike, applied to both graduate and undergraduate students, will generate $190.3 million on an annual basis.

That is offset by $63.4 million that must be funneled to financial aid for students. So the net added revenue to the system is $126.9 million.

Graham said Chico State won't be adamant about fee deadlines.

"We certainly aren't going to be throwing anybody out of school. We are very lenient on (fee deadline) dates," said Graham.

Since before Gov. Gray Davis revealed his first proposed budget for the coming fiscal year in January, officials at Chico State and the CSU have claimed fee increases are necessary if the system and the campus are going to weather the current budgetary crisis.

"The most important thing is to have the classes available," said Graham.

The vice president said Chico State may offer fewer sections of some classes than in the past but he said in most cases that comes from smaller classes being consolidated, so the total number of available seats in particular subjects are about the same.

He also said there doesn't seem to be any indication that enrollment at Chico State is going to fall off.

"I have not seen anything to indicate there is a fear of fall-off here. If anything, it (enrollment) looks strong," said Graham.