Community College Initiative Will Not Be on the November 2006 Ballot

The proposed Community College Funding Stabilization and Student Fee Act of 2006 will not qualify for the November 2006 election due to cost increases in signature gathering, according to sponsors of the initiative. The initiative is intended to provide community colleges with their own separate “pot” of Proposition 98 funding, reduce community college enrollment fees from $26 to $20 per unit, and give the Board of Governors and Chancellor the same independence as the California State Universities. Read the rest of this entry »

Data on Enrollment Growth and Decline

The Chancellor’s Office reports that 36 districts reported growth and qualify for Growth Funding in 2005-06 in the amount of $71.5 million. Six districts are growing by restoring FTES lost in prior years, but not enough to qualify for growth funding. Twenty-seven districts are experiencing current year FTES decline that totals more than $70 million. Nine districts that experienced a prior-year decline were able to partially—or, in the case of four of these districts, totally—restore previously lost FTES. Read the rest of this entry »

What Factors Should You Consider Heading into Mediation?

What are some of the factors that we should be considering related to comparability and maintenance of effort as we head into mediation with our teachers’ bargaining unit?

When preparing for negotiations, we recommend that you prepare every year as if you will need to go through the entire impasse process. That means that you will need to be able to demonstrate your district’s comparability and maintenance of effort, along with several other factors.

In any fiscal debate, it is essential that the district be able to reflect the comparison of its salaries and benefits with those of other districts and to show, as well, the level of financial commitment made by the district to employees. No district presentation would be acceptable without these two characteristics being addressed either in evidence or discussions at the bargaining table.

The level of the district’s salaries and benefits needs to be compared with other districts in an appropriate comparative group. Generally, these are geographical—the same labor market as the district—but they could be comparisons based upon size or based upon revenue level. Be careful, however, to ensure that the comparisons reflect appropriate districts. Southern California districts cannot be effectively compared with Northern California districts—there is a significant differential in salary and benefit amounts between those two regions.

The district needs to also show the level of its financial commitment made to employees. That is, how do the district’s expenditure allocations for personnel salary and benefits compare with those of other districts? The district must be able to show that it can commit a high proportion of its budget to these characteristics—hopefully a higher percentage or dollar amount than other districts in the comparative market. Another method for demonstrating your level of effort is by showing your compensation increases for both salary and benefits over time compared to the comparable districts that you have selected. Demonstrating your level of effort shows your commitment to people versus things or your commitment to teachers versus other parts of district services or classroom expense versus other expenses. Demonstrating your level of effort is a very important part of any district presentation.

Comparisons in salary and benefits are the most important factors in determining whether or not districts should propose a higher total compensation amount. In establishing your negotiating guide, use the comparative analysis of salaries paid and not the percentage growth in the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA). The COLA allocation as a pass through to employees is a shorthand methodology that will often get the district into trouble. Instead, compare your employees’ salaries to the salaries of an appropriate comparative group and the Consumer Price Index.

CPEC to Examine How Well Community Colleges Are Serving Rural and Remote Areas of California

The California Postsecondary Education Commission (CPEC) is in the process of convening a statewide advisory committee that will look at the challenges that community college districts confront when trying to serve rural and remote communities. To guide their discussion, CPEC will address several policy questions, including:

1. What are some of the most difficult challenges confronting local districts in serving rural and remote areas? How might CPEC, as the state’s higher education planning and coordinating body, be of assistance at the statewide and regional level?
2. What specific types of strategies and institutional arrangements do community college districts use to enhance educational services in rural and remote areas? What has been the relative success of those strategies and arrangements?
3. What proposals are currently under consideration by lawmakers and educators to address community college access issues in rural and remote areas?
4. Should certain aspects of program-based funding and CPEC’s facility review guidelines be changed or modified to better reflect the service-delivery and enrollment constraints faced by districts in serving rural and remote areas?

It is also the intent of CPEC to consider SB 362 (Scott, D-Altadena), the pending proposal to create a new funding formula for community colleges.

CPEC points out that the ability of local community college districts to serve all communities in California will be determined by population growth, industrial and labor market training needs, and the academic aspirations of residents. The Department of Finance estimates, based on recent birth and migration trends, that the state’s population will jump from 36.8 million in the year 2005 to 43.8 million in the year 2020, with the state passing the 40 million mark in the year 2012.

Although rural areas of the state are expected to grow at a slower pace than the general population, CPEC’s 2005 regional enrollment study found that all regions of the state will face significant capacity pressures over the next 15 years. Regions that are anticipated to post above-average annual growth rates include: the Sacramento area, the North Central Valley, the Riverside County region, and the Imperial County region. Regardless of where Californians reside, CPEC believes that it is its responsibility to ensure that all geographic areas of the state are served adequately, since capital outlay funds are used to expand the state’s higher education enterprise.

For planning purposes, CPEC will clarify the terms “rural” and “remote.” Across all age groups, nearly 87% of the state’s population resided within a 10-mile radius of a California community college in the year 2000. According to CPEC, if you apply a statewide mean community college participation rate of 7.0% to the proportion of adults who reside outside a 10-mile radius (13%), it yields an enrollment demand estimate of 191,338 prospective community college students. The numerical challenge to the state of serving students in remote areas, i.e., those residing more than 60 miles from a community college campus or center, is likely to be a small fraction of this latter figure. Even so, instructional, support service, and capital outlay costs could be substantial.

It is anticipated that CPEC will consider for adoption at its September 2006 meeting a set of recommendations proposed by the advisory committee that address the needs of serving students in rural and remote areas.

Another Run at Repealing School Contracting Restrictions

Legislation has been introduced to repeal SB 1419, which severely restricted the ability of local K-12 and community college districts to contract out for personal services. Since the passage of SB 1419 in 2002, five bills have been introduced in an effort to repeal its provisions. Those bills have failed passage despite the support of Governor Schwarzenegger, who even included the repeal of SB 1419 in his proposed 2004-05 State Budget. Read the rest of this entry »

Legislation Introduced to Prohibit Certain Students From Participating in Intercollegiate Athletics

Assembly Member Jay La Suer (R-La Mesa) has introduced AB 2165, which is intended to prohibit participation in intercollegiate athletics by students who have been prosecuted and convicted of certain violent felonies. Specifically, AB 2165 prohibits any student athlete at the community colleges, California State University (CSU) or the University of California (UC) from participating as a member of any intercollegiate athletic team or event, if he or she, at any time after his or her enrollment as a college or university student, is prosecuted and convicted of murder, kidnapping, robbery, battery against a sports official, assault, rape, burglary, or attempted murder.

Existing law does not specifically prohibit those convicted of such crimes from participating in intercollegiate athletics, but does provide community colleges, CSU, and UC with discretion to determine eligibility for and participation in intercollegiate athletics. Read the rest of this entry »

Redirecting Unspent Growth Funds

At its January 2006 meeting, the Board of Governors directed the Chancellor and staff to work through the consultation process to develop a plan for redirecting unspent 2005-06 growth funds, to the extent that they materialize, to meet key system priorities that were not addressed in the Governor’s proposed 2006-07 State Budget. The Chancellor’s Office staff convened a meeting of the “Budget Workgroup” to develop a plan and recommendations for the redirection of unspent growth dollars.According to the Chancellor’s Office, based on the first principal (P-1) apportionment FTES of 2005-06, about $68 million of unspent growth appropriations may be available for redirection. This projection, however, is subject to considerable revision, depending on actual enrollments for the upcoming winter, spring, and summer terms. Read the rest of this entry »

Governor Looks to the Future in State-of-the-State Address

In his highly anticipated third State-of-the-State address, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger laid out a sweeping vision for California that hearkened back to the future, recalling former governors of both parties who built the state: “In the face of massive and huge challenges, they built the foundation of California’s prosperity,” the Governor said, “They built the schools and universities that became the envy of the world. They built the bridges and aqueducts, the highways and hospitals that made California the economic powerhouse it is today.” And then he laid out his own plan.As pundits predicted, this year’s speech–as opposed to last year’s–was about building bridges, not burning them. The tone of his speech was unfailingly optimistic, even offering a mea culpa. “I have thought about last year and the mistakes that I have made,” he said, acknowledging that the people wanted action, not rhetoric, and cooperation, not conflict. To which he added, “To my fellow Californians, I say, ‘message received’.” So he concentrated on the future. Read the rest of this entry »

State Revenues Continue to Outpace Projections

For the seventh straight month, state General Fund revenues have outperformed the projections upon which the current year budget is based. Through November, collections total $2.4 billion more than expected ($550 million in 2004-05 and $1.9 billion in 2005-06). For the month of November alone, collections exceeded the monthly projection by $145 million, or 2.8%.The Department of Finance reports that current-year collections are running 6.3% above estimate, with the greatest strength coming from the corporation tax (up almost 25%), followed by the personal income tax (up 6.2%) and the sales and use tax (up 2.6%). A strong showing in corporate profits related to the summer�s high fuel prices has been identified as one of the principal reasons for the strength in the corporate tax.

To put the latest information into context, the Legislative Analyst recently projected that total state General Fund revenues for 2004-05 and 2005-06 would exceed the 2005 Budget Act forecast by $3.9 billion. Thus, the state has already collected 60% of the Legislative Analyst�s projected increase, with seven months of the fiscal year remaining, including the major collection months of December, January, and April.

If the state economy continues to produce revenues at a pace that exceeds expectations, the state�s structural budget problem would be reduced, although not completely eliminated. We hope that this development, coupled with the Administration�s interpretation of the results of the special election, will produce a January Governor�s Budget that treats education more favorably than last year. Read the rest of this entry »

LAO Forecasts a Less Dire–But Still Dicey–Budget Outlook

Due to a combination of a revenue upturn and reduced spending, Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill writes in a November 16, 2005, report that California�s budget outlook for 2006-07 has “improved significantly” but “still faces major operating deficits in the next several years.”"We’re not out of the woods yet,” Hill later told a group of Capitol reporters.

This forecast–the annually produced “California’s Fiscal Outlook”–is the first real peek at the fiscal context for the 2006-07 California State Budget, and not only is it the earliest, it is also widely hailed as being the most objective and accurate. (The entire report is available online at: http://www.lao.ca.gov/2005/fiscal_outlook/fiscal_outlook_05.pdf.) Read the rest of this entry »