Published March 6, 2009
By Michelle Dupler, Tri-City Herald staff writer

Students talk and study Thursday in the lounge at Columbia Basin College in Pasco, where officials say they may have to cut some programs and enroll 400 fewer students this fall because of state budget cuts. Photo by Paul T. Erickson of the Tri-City Herald

PASCO -- Columbia Basin College officials are preparing to cut as much as $3 million from the $23 million the college would have received from the state in the next two years.

And CBC President Rich Cummins said cutting that 12 percent will mean cutting programs and classes and enrolling 400 fewer students at a time when college officials think enrollment should be growing.

"We will need to cut programs," Cummins said. "If we receive a $3 million cut, there is no way we can maintain our current level of service."

The cuts are coming as the state faces a projected $8.3 billion or more revenue shortfall for the rest of 2009 and the 2009-2011 biennium.

Gov. Chris Gregoire asked in her budget proposal released in December for community colleges to plan for cuts of about 6.5 percent, Cummins said. But that was when the state's deficit appeared to be $5.7 billion.

Now that the revenue gap has widened, the community college system is preparing for the worst.

"There is a big, big difference in those numbers," Cummins said. "It doesn't look good."

And because community colleges are already lean operations, cutting budgets means cutting instructional programs and students, he said.

Cummins told the Herald's editorial board Thursday that the college is funded for 4,822 full-time equivalent students, but has the equivalent of 5,225 full-time students enrolled.

That number reflects an average of the number of credit hours students are enrolled for, divided by the actual number of students on campus, to get a picture of how many students there would be if every student went to school full-time.

Cummins said the 4,822-student level is maintained in Gregoire's budget proposal, but CBC won't be able to take on more students, meaning its traditional policy of opening its doors to everyone who wants to enroll will be rethought.

"We will hit that 4,822 (students) come hell or high water because that is our charge, but we won't go much beyond that," Cummins said, adding he thinks there's enough demand in the community that CBC could enroll up to 6,000 full-time equivalents.

But budget cuts will mean fewer offerings, which in turn will mean competition for seats in classes. And while CBC won't move toward a model of evaluating which students are more qualified to attend college -- as four-year institutions do -- it will have to take students first come, first served.

"It makes the bile rise in our throats because the whole goal is access to higher education," Cummins said. "We're not supposed to be turning people away."

And especially in tough economic times, people turn to community colleges for retraining when they get laid off from their jobs, he said.

"It just stinks -- the whole situation," he said.

The community and technical college system won't know just how much it has to cut until the Legislature proposes a biennial budget, probably sometime in April.

Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, D-Spokane, said at a weekly media availability Thursday that she couldn't offer much information about the shape of budget cuts, but that lawmakers are talking about what programs to slash and what to keep.

"There will be reductions in all areas of state services that are not protected either constitutionally or legally, such as debt service," Brown said. "We are trying to work cooperatively between the House and the Senate to do this thoughtfully given the consequences for people."

Cummins also couldn't offer details on what programs might be cut, but said the college will try to preserve its burgeoning agricultural program, and work with community partners such as Energy Northwest to develop nuclear technology and other energy programs that will train workers for jobs in high demand fields.

Another facet of slashing the budget means it's hard to attract and keep talented instructors in those kinds of programs, he said.

"Man, oh man, we have had nothing but bad luck," Cummins said. "People come and they leave. The salary is terrible ... compared to what they can make out in the field."

But the picture wasn't all doom and gloom. Because the money for construction projects comes from a different budget than money for operations and instruction, CBC still is expecting funding for a new career and technical center where the college will house trade work and energy programs, he said.

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