Cal State Long Beach students and faculty are pressing to keep higher education in the forefront as the state budget impasse drags on.
California entered its fiscal year 2010-11 last week without a finalized budget, and a budget is not expected until October. The legislature and governor face a $19 billion deficit.
Since 2008, the state has decreased funding to the university. The CSULB Department of Administration and Finance website projects an unresolved budget shortfall of more than $19 million for 2010-11.
The funding crisis has led to ever-increasing student fees, as well as faculty furloughs and layoffs. Administrators struggle to make budget decisions without a clear picture of future state funding.
Students feel the sting
California Faculty Association member and CSULB English lecturer Elizabeth Hoffman said the last few years of budget cuts have been devastating to students. Students have dealt with decreased class time and furlough days, coupled with increasing fees. Cal State campuses have placed freezes on new student enrollment.
“There is a chance of getting a better CSU budget, [but] the $365 million proposed is not going to make it through without public pressure,” she said. “There’s been pressure from everywhere: students, faculty and staff have been sending e-mails to the governor.”
In the 2009-10 academic year, students staged mass protests, wrote letters and organized art shows to express their discontent with the impact of the budget crisis on their education.
The California State University board of trustees voted for an additional 5 percent increase in student fees in June. Since 2006-07, annual fees have increased a total of $1,800.
Additionally, the CSULB Department of Administration and Finance website proposes cuts for 2010-11 to student services, athletics and academic affairs, among other departments.
Faculty fear layoffs, pay cuts
Erik Fallis, a representative from the CSU Chancellor’s Office, said that the number of CSULB faculty was reduced from 2,124 to 1,904 in the last academic year, a decrease of about 11 percent. Most of the layoffs were adjunct instructors who do not have the protections of tenure.
“We lost a lot of faculty last year,” Hoffman said. “We need to turn that around.”
Remaining faculty were affected last year by a mandatory two-day-per-month unpaid furlough. The DAF budget for 2010-11 assumes no furloughs.
An unsure future
The governor’s most recent budget proposal revision maintains a $366 million restoration to the CSU budget over last year, according to calstate.edu. However, an e-mail sent to all students on July 7 by President F. King Alexander stated that the budget proposal assumes a 10 percent increase in student fees. The most recent increase was 5 percent. It remains unclear whether the CSU board of trustees will increase fees again to make up the difference.
“CSU has reserved the right, even after initial fee payments are made, to increase or modify listed fees, without notice, until the date when instruction for a particular semester or quarter has begun,” Alexander wrote. “While it is good news that the board was able to keep the state university fee increase to 5 percent, the board also resolved because of the precarious budget situation to review at its meeting in November 2010 … to determine whether any additional fee increases are required.”
For budget updates, see daf.csulb.edu and calstate.edu.
Bridgette Bryant and Athena Mekis contributed to this article.
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