Students Protest Effects of Pierce College Budget Cuts

More than 50 students temporarily disrupted a board meeting of the Los Angeles Community College District at Pierce College on Wednesday to protest tuition hikes and state budget cuts.

The Woodland Hills school was the hardest hit of the district’s nine colleges by a proposed 1993-94 budget released in January. It suggests 11.6% cuts, which prompted Pierce officials to cancel summer school this year rather than risk having to cut classes during the regular year.

“We want our budget back,” said Michael De Busk, a sophomore chemistry major. De Busk was one of an estimated 50 students who walked in on the board’s meeting Wednesday morning as Neil Yoneji, vice chancellor of business services, was making a presentation.

The students, carrying signs with slogans such as “Put Money Into Education Now or Millions Into Welfare Later,” circled an audience sitting in the Pierce auditorium. When Yoneji finished speaking, they stamped on the floor, chanting “We want our summer school back” and “We want our future.”

De Busk, who was subsequently allowed to address the board, also assailed what he said was the shabby appearance of classrooms and a lack of equipment.

“Pierce is one of the finest community colleges in the state,” De Busk said. “But by having our funding decreased, this high level of education is stagnant.”

Board member Lindsay Conner said the proposed cuts, which reflect Gov. Pete Wilson’s suggested 11.1% funding reduction for the state’s community colleges, have not been “set in concrete.”

The proposed budget is down $11.3 million from this year’s $240.5-million spending plan.

Wilson said the colleges could offset some of the decrease in state funding if they triple fees for undergraduate students to $30 a unit and more than double fees for those who already have bachelor’s degrees to $130 a unit.

“If they raise the tuition to $30 a unit I won’t be able to afford it,” said Jini Wong, a sophomore art major.

A crowd of more than 200 people, mostly students, packed the same auditorium later in the afternoon, and about 20 speakers addressed the board, most of them protesting the budget cuts.

The board subsequently approved a resolution to formulate a comprehensive plan to deal with the present and future budget shortfalls.

The plan includes lobbying Sacramento, drawing up a master plan for capital improvements at district campuses and authorizing a $25,000 poll to determine whether the public would be willing to pass a bond measure to fund the plan.

“It’s an attempt to move the district away from solving one year’s emergency at a time,” said board member Wallace Knox.

Missing from the resolution was a proposal to send letters warning administrators who work at campuses that are not planning to offer summer school courses that they may be laid off for the summer session. So far, Pierce is the only campus where summer courses have been canceled.

Board members Knox and David Lopez-Lee agreed to withdraw the item after hearing the proposal assailed by speakers such as Daniel Means, executive director of the district’s administrators association. Means said 16 administrators at Pierce would experience a 23% drop in pay if they were laid off for the summer.