Colleges Adopt Final Spending Plan : Education: The $62.4-million budget, 4% above last year, will allow addition of 80 classes beginning next semester at the area’s three campuses.

Hoping to expand classes and attract students during its spring semester, the Ventura County Community College District has adopted a final budget that includes a marketing campaign, an increase in funds for hiring part-time teachers, and a cost-of-living adjustment for employees.

The $62.4-million budget for 1995-96 is 4% greater than last year’s spending plan and will allow the district--encompassing Oxnard, Ventura and Moorpark colleges--to add 80 classes in the spring and summer semesters.

“I’m certainly pleased with it and the way it worked out,” Trustee John Tallman said of the unanimously approved budget. “What we need to do is fight for more money from the state.”

The larger budget is the result of increased state allocations, which include property tax revenue and the first cost-of-living adjustment that California’s community colleges have seen in several years.

But the budget also contains $2.1 million that the district could lose if it does not increase enrollment by 1,000 full-time students next year.

Trustees are pinning their hopes on the spring semester, when they expect more students to return to classes.

The 1995-96 budget includes a 9% increase in funds for hiring part-time faculty members, who will teach the added classes in the spring if enrollment climbs. Beginning next semester, students with college degrees will pay $13 per unit, the same as all other students on campus, instead of the $50 per unit they have paid for three years.

“We’re looking at the spring as a real good window of opportunity to recover our declining enrollment,” Chancellor James Walker said.

But the 80 added sections will make up only a fraction of the 300 sections that were cut three years ago in the face of declining enrollment.

As in past years, most of the budget--about 89%--is earmarked for teacher and staff salaries, benefits and retirement packages.

The district will use the remaining money for a new telephone system and capital improvements--such as building a science and letters building at Oxnard College and equipment for the performing arts building at Moorpark College.

Not included in the budget is a $566,000 one-time block grant from the state to be used for supplies, equipment and deferred maintenance.

But trustees say much of the budget is made up of projections from the state, which often change throughout the year.

“It’s been a struggle for community colleges in recent years facing a topsy-turvy budget process at the state level, making it very difficult to plan,” Trustee Timothy Hirschberg said.