Colleges like the fix.Both Jose Fierro and Willy Duncan, presidents of Cerritos College and Sierra College, respectively, told CalMatters they would not have built the affordable student housing projects without this change. In place of those funds, the bill package says the state intends to find the money before that summer deadline so that the community colleges won’t have to, resolving the quagmire. The two bills would allow community colleges to keep the money they’ve already gotten and return the cash by early summer next year. The community colleges’ departures from the dorm program would have undermined a novel state effort to house nearly 6,000 community college students in affordable student housing - and thousands more at the state’s public universities - at a time when 20% of community college students experience homelessness. But without a concrete guarantee that the state would supply the campuses the $78.5 million annually to cover their debt payments, at least two colleges - Cerritos and Sierra - would have backed out of their plans. Gavin Newsom yanked that money in June to address California’s then-$31.5 billion budget shortfall.Instead, those community colleges were told to borrow that money using a financial tool known as a revenue bond, with the state promising to cover the debt payments for 30 years. Though Cerritos, Sierra and 17 other California community colleges were promised $1.1 billion in state cash upfront to construct affordable student housing, state lawmakers and Gov. Cerritos College in Los Angeles County was about to cancel plans to build affordable dorms for 396 students at rents of just above $700 a month.Īnother community college, Sierra College in Rocklin, was planning to abandon construction of homes for 354 students at rents of $450 a month.Now two bills are making their way through the Legislature that will allow those projects to continue and reverse a June budget deal that panicked community colleges.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |