SACRAMENTO -- Here is what students at California's public universities are up against next year: higher fees, fewer financial-aid scholarships, caps on enrollment and $600 million in unassigned cutbacks.

Gov. Schwarzenegger also suggested in his budget proposal Friday an increase in spending at the University of California at Merced to keep its fall 2005 opening on track.

The Senate's most influential leader described that recommendation Monday as "questionable logic," reflecting the struggle UC Merced backers have in coming months as lawmakers wrangle over budget details.

"If you're cutting the university system, it just seems bizarre to start opening up a campus," said Senate President Pro Tem John Burton, D-San Francisco.

Burton promised Monday to fight the governor's new budget plan, arguing that it provides car owners with a big tax break paid for by service cuts to the poor and disabled.

Despite $350 million the state already has spent on UC Merced -- construction is progressing and faculty has been hired -- Burton said it's "never too late to do anything," like halt progress on the campus.

Schwarzenegger asked the Legislature to give UC Merced an extra $10 million to open the campus on time, for a total of $20 million.

Burton, a longtime critic of UC Merced, has not blocked previous funding efforts for the campus. But pressure might be growing, and he won't be the only one suggesting better uses for the UC Merced money, especially this year.

Sen. Jack Scott, D-Altadena, said the extra UC Merced money needs to be considered in context of other cutbacks to colleges and universities.

"All of these things will have to be taken into account," said Scott, who heads a higher education budget subcommittee.

Assemblywoman Barbara Matthews, D-Tracy, who represents the Merced area, expects the new campus to be among the "bargaining chips" legislators try to use to balance the budget.

"It will be on the table," said Matthews, the leading supporter of the school in the Assembly.

To pull out now "would be a waste of money, if you agree with it or not," said Sen. Jeff Denham, R-Merced.

Burton criticized Schwarzenegger's entire spending plan, claiming it relies too much on borrowing and one-time solutions and fails to address the state's core spending imbalance because no new taxes are being proposed.

Schwarzenegger's $99.1 billion budget plan, released Friday, calls for more than $4 billion in cuts to virtually all levels of the state bureaucracy -- although the largest share, about $1.7 billion, would come from public health and welfare programs.

The governor would also take another $1.3 billion from cities and counties -- cuts that are also likely to hit social service programs hardest.

Burton noted that Schwarzenegger himself helped create the state's $14 billion shortfall when he rolled back car taxes in November -- a move that cut revenues by $4 billion a year.

"What we have here is the poorest people in our society -- the elderly, the blind and the disabled -- being asked to pay for basically the car tax cut," Burton said.

H.D. Palmer, spokesman for the governor's department of finance, said Democrats don't like Schwarzenegger's budget because it imposes discipline on spending.

"It's very understandable that some members of the Legislature may have a hard time coming to grips with this budget," said Palmer. "The bill has finally come due for the years of overspending."

The budget, which must be approved by a two-thirds majority of the Legislature, also calls for nearly $7 billion in borrowing and one-time solutions next year -- solutions Schwarzenegger has previously criticized for causing the state's fiscal crisis.

Included in the borrowing is $3 billion that would come out of the $15 billion bond issue that will go before voters in March.

There is an additional $2 billion in deferred payments to schools.

Another $1 billion is shifted to the general fund from sales tax money set aside by voters in 2002's Proposition 42 for transportation programs. The governor also proposed borrowing $925 million to pay off pension obligations.

Burton said he did not believe serious negotiations over the budget plan would begin before the March election.