COMMUNITY COMMENTARY -- William E. Vega

As we enter the back-to-school season this month, Orange County’s

community colleges are still reeling from the news we recently received

-- that this year’s state budget included dramatic cuts in our funding.

When legislators in Sacramento finally agreed in July on a state

spending plan for 2001-02, we knew we would have to do more with less.

But Gov. Gray Davis vetoed $126 million more from community colleges,

including ongoing scheduled maintenance and instructional equipment

funds. Community colleges in Orange County and throughout the state were

stunned. That $126 million represented 23% of all the governor’s blueline

cuts.

The most significant reduction is losing the nearly $100 million in

ongoing funding for scheduled maintenance and instructional materials --

$3 million of which would have been allocated to Coast Community College

District colleges -- Coastline Community College, Golden West College and

Orange Coast College. Those funds would have been used for building

maintenance and energy conservation programs, projects aimed at

protecting the health and safety of students and upgrades for computers

and other technology we use to train the high-tech workers Orange

County’s economy demands.

California’s community college system, including the Coast Community

College District, is facing the largest student enrollment increase in

all of higher education. It is a travesty that we received the smallest

budget increase of the state’s three state-run institutions this year.

The 3.2% increase in community college system funding was below both the

University of California system at 4.8% and the California State

University system at 6.4%.

Over the last decade, California’s community colleges have become

experts at serving the largest segment of the state’s higher education

students with the fewest resources. Thanks to chronic under-funding,

we’ve had lots of practice. Because we have never received our full

allotment of funding from Proposition 98, community colleges have had to

do without a cumulative $2.7 billion allocated to us by the voters of

this state in 1988.

The Coast Community College District is feeling the budget squeeze

even more due to an unfair state funding formula that gives us one of the

lowest allocations in the state, despite our area’s high cost of living

and burgeoning economy.

Meanwhile, we continue to face the challenges of providing educational

opportunities at an affordable price to an influx of new students. The

students who make up the so-called “Tidal Wave II” are now graduating

from high school and heading to community colleges in droves -- creating

the largest student enrollment increase in all of higher education.

Community colleges will be scrambling for some relief from the

governor’s draconian budget cuts this fall. Meanwhile, rest assured that

the Coast Community College District will continue to do what it does

best -- provide more opportunities for more students with fewer

resources. But how long can we continue to do so?

* William M. Vega is chancellor of the Coast Community College

District, which is responsible for the district’s three colleges --

Coastline Community College, Golden West College, Orange Coast College --

and the district’s public broadcasting station, KOCE-TV. The district,

the seventh largest in the nation in credit enrollment, serves 55,000

students each semester, employs more than 5,000 full- and part-time

faculty and staff and has an annual budget of more than $161 million.