MCC faces critical budget

By: Chyna Broadnax | Statesville Record & Landmark
Published: May 29, 2011

Mitchell Community College, along with most other public schools across the country, is buckling down for what is sure to be a trying fiscal year.

The college, which has grown in enrollment by 40 percent in the past three years, stands to lose nearly $240,000 in North Carolina Education Lottery monies that funded 256 scholarships last year, according to MCC spokesperson Kathy Holland. But that’s only the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

A proposed budget in the North Carolina House calls for a 10 percent reduction in funding for community colleges and a 15.5 percent cut for universities, according to Holland. The Senate, meanwhile, is proposing a 12 percent cut for colleges, according to the Senate Appropriations Committee on Education/Higher Education Target Comparison published May 9.

Ten percent of MCC’s budget is roughly $1 million.

Those reductions, according to MCC President Doug Eason, will put “tremendous pressure on the institution in every category.”

Public funding of school districts and universities is based on student enrollment projections, but that is not the case for community colleges, whose funding levels are based on the prior year's enrollment.

And county funding will be just as hard to come by.

During Thursday's budget workshop, MCC asked the Iredell County Board of Commissioners for a total of $3.42 million, a decrease from last year's $3.6 million request.

County money pays for facilities and operational expenses while state dollars cover academic programs.

Eason is optimistic the county will consider the college’s needs “in light of our growth.”

But state funding, he said, is "a real critical issue."

To cope with a funding reduction, the college aims to focus all its resources on instructional programs, Eason said. That would lead to cutbacks in travel, new technology and faculty development.

“We will do everything possible not to impact classrooms,” Eason added. “Classrooms and programs will remain intact --- anything outside of that is up for consideration.”

Eason hopes the college won't have to implement layoffs.

“We have not notified anyone of any risks of layoffs at this point and we hope we don’t have to,” he said. “We need everyone we’ve got.”