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Colleagues-
The Academic Senate President, VP, and the CCCUE President met with President Dave Pelham and VPSL Cathleen Greiner yesterday to discuss our concerns regarding the current process to determine and prioritize budget reduction strategies, and we are pleased to inform you that we have agreed to slow down the process and work more collaboratively on solving our budget crisis. However, we also wish to inform you that, even though we now have determined a more collaborative process to make this decision, this whole experience has amplified our concerns about shared governance practices on this campus.
Late in the Fall 2008 semester, it was decided that a Joint Planning and Budget Committee (PBC) and Shared Governance Council (SGC) meeting would focus on determining possible strategies our campus community might implement to offset the state’s $1.4 million cut to our operating budget. Much of the meeting on Tuesday, however, was centered on the administration’s proposal to cut the summer session. The agenda did not include the proposal, any background information for this proposal, or supporting data, and we were neither consulted nor given reasonable advance notice that the purpose of the meeting had been changed. We did brainstorm some suggestions for cost reductions at the end of our meeting, but for a decision of this magnitude, we needed much more information to prepare for the meeting. We also needed more time to gather feedback from our constituent groups.
At our meeting yesterday, Dr. Pelham and Dr. Greiner agreed to our proposal to postpone our campus decision for cost reduction strategies. Also, the next Joint PBC/SGC Meeting on Tues., Feb. 3rd will focus primarily on a discussion of what to do with the Summer 2009 semester. At last Tuesday’s meeting, the administration proposed drastic cuts to this summer’s schedule and a strict limitation of campus operations to the use of three buildings. However, after our discussion with Dr. Pelham and Dr. Greiner yesterday, the idea of building reduction for Summer ‘09 is off the table. Instead, we were told that one proposal will be a 1/3 reduction across the board for Summer ’09, the specifics of which would be determined by each division chair in consultation with the relevant deans and the VPSL. The other option that we were told would be on the agenda is an elimination of the Summer ‘09 semester, and there may be other proposals regarding Summer ’09 on the agenda as well. CCFT, CCCUE and Senate leadership have asked for the specifics to these summer semester proposals, including line item estimates based on past summers for the cost savings to the District, and we have been promised that this data will be delivered to the members of SGC and PBC on Monday morning to help us have an informed discussion about Summer 2009 on Tuesday.
One other result from yesterday’s meeting is that we will reschedule a Joint SGC/PBC meeting four to five weeks after next Tuesday’s meeting; during the interim, we will have time to request other cost reduction strategies from our constituents that we may add to our final prioritization list. Last Tuesday’s 15-minute brainstorming session only provided us with a short, global list of cost reduction strategies, which we were being asked to prioritize on Tuesday, but we all agreed that it would be in the best interests of our campus community to slow down this process and make a decision instead in early March.
We believe that our campus decisions regarding cost reduction strategies in these challenging times must be fair, realistic, practical, and inclusive of all voices on campus, and we hope that the administration’s willingness to slow down the process of determining budget cuts signals their commitment to genuine collaboration in the future.
Regards-
Steve Leone, Academic Senate President Allison Merzon, CCFT President
Beth-Ann Dumas, Academic Senate VP Peet Cocke, CCFT VP
John Fetcho, CCCUE President Joel Carlson, CCCUE VP
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