It’s an admirable quality, perhaps a holdover from pioneer days, that Oregonians generally are frugal. In fact, Sen. Peter Courtney of Salem, the most senior member of the Legislature, noted a month before the Legislature convened that we have more restrictions on our state over how and when money can be spent than anywhere else you care to find.

But the difference between someone who is frugal and someone who is out and out miserly, is that the frugal person knows when to make a wise investment; when to spend money to make money. That person knows when to fix the roof before it starts to leak and when to repair the foundation before the building sags and no longer generates rental income.

That’s the point at which we find Oregon’s system of higher education today; with crumbling buildings and a system that desperately is in need of some strategic expenditures to halt the decay in both buildings, educational opportunities and quality and affordability.

Some long-standing, lamentable higher ed statistics:

• Oregon ranks 46th in the nation in public support of its state university system.

• Older Oregonians are better educated, with about 41 percent of those between ages 45 and 54 having some kind of college degree compared with 36 percent of Oregonians ages 25 to 34.

• More middle-income students can’t even afford a state-sponsored college education because — in a flip-flop from their parents’ tuition obligation — they pay 70 percent of their educational costs compared with 30 percent paid for by the public.

Much of that bad news could begin the long road to improvement this year.

For the first time in 15 years, there’s enough state revenue to invest in some much-needed repairs.

Yet some folks at the Capitol are saying that this still isn’t the time to spend this money; that it should be tucked away against the inevitable “rainy day” when the state’s economy will take another downturn.

Well, anyone who cares to review the state’s higher ed situation during the past 15 years will see that it’s been raining there for such a long time that the figurative roof is buckling.

Increasing the higher education budget by 17 percent this biennum would infuse $827 million over the last biennium.

Gov. Ted Kulongoski’s budget targets that money where it will do the most good. We particularly like the proposed $36 million that would go to defray tuition expenses for students through the Oregon Opportunity Grants Program.

We also like the money earmarked to bolster the statewide programs based at Oregon State University, such as the Extension Service and the experiment stations, which has helped farmers break into Asian markets, the timber industry develop new products and coastal fisheries to revive.

In nanotechnology, at $1 million investment has reaped many times that in seven years.

We have to spend money to make money, and we must invest in our future by educating young Oregonians instead of constantly

importing out-of-state talent.

Oregon’s university system has weathered enough financial storms; it’s time to fix what needs fixing.