Branstad’s Budget Plan Could Cut More Than $1.5M From SCC

scc-logo-218x112

Southeastern Community College could be working with a significantly smaller budget for the FY 18 school year after another round of budget cuts were announced by Governor Branstad Wednesday.

SCC President Dr. Michael Ash talked with Steve Hexom and Rob Sussman on KBUR’s Talk Show Wednesday morning and says the college will lose more than $1.5 million dollars in next year’s budget, and that Workforce Development programs could take the biggest hit.

“It does impact some of our workforce development programs, like GAP which is a program of tuition… it helps non-credit for tuition, those individuals who cannot afford truck driving school…or pay the whole bill. Then there’s some GAP funding that’s available, that will be impacted,” Ash said. He went on to talk about another program that will see cuts, saying “we have a new program called PACE that’s been about four years in the making…and that will be probably devastated.”

The SCC website says the PACE program is for un-or underemployed workers, those without a high school diploma, and people with incomes at or below the federal poverty level, and says that it can help them overcome fears of going back to school by mapping education goals and creating plans to achieve them.

This is the second year of cuts, as Dr. Ash says that around $200,000 was cut from their budget this year. Ash says the school has made do with cuts to this year’s budget by leaving 28 positions unfilled at the college and asking employees to take on extra responsibilities. Ash says that the school has already been dipping into their reserve funds over the last several years to make sure they did not have a budget deficit.

Although the budget cuts are significant, Dr. Ash says that they will not affect the projects currently underway at the college, saying “the capital projects that are underway are both tax and private donation supported, so those are not in line for any kind of cuts or discontinuation. What it does affect, however, is we can build a building…but can we hire a custodian to keep it clean?”

The cuts are part of a $173M dollar budget cut announced by Governor Branstad Wednesday, Ash says that the majority of the cuts at the college will be in operations, and workforce development programs.