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# Santa Monica College facing financial fall-out
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/santa-monica-college-facing-financial-fall-out/
- Published: 2003-02-15T16:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T01:35:13.000Z
- Author: Andrew Fixmer
- Tags: Education, Santa Monica, #archive-import

*‘Ramifications are sobering’ at Santa Monica College*

The future isn’t looking so bright for Santa Monica College.

With nearly a quarter of its $114 million budget expected to be slashed by the end of next year, college officials are preparing for lay-offs, tuition hikes and fee increases.

“We think it’s the worst budget situation since World War II,” said SMC spokesman Bruce Smith. “That’s how drastic it is.”

> “We think it’s the worst budget situation since World War II. That’s how drastic it is.” — — BRUCE SMITH Santa Monica College spokesman

The college’s budget was cut by $8 million before the current school year began, and the number of classes offered was reduced by 3 percent.

Now — to help plug California’s historic $34.5 billion deficit — the level of state funding to SMC is being reduced again by another $5 million.

The college has nixed raises for managers, who last received a pay increase in January 2002\. College officials also reduced spring semester classes by 7.5 percent, closing 250 courses to students. Every department must make a 10 percent reduction in their annual operating costs. All temporary employees were let go Friday.

But the worst is yet to come. Next year, college officials are predicting another $15 million cut in state funding, Smith said.

“The administration is grappling with the best way of handling this,” Smith said.

The California School Employees Association has distributed a flyer stating that at least 125 of the 460 maintenance workers, secretaries, groundskeepers, and others they represent are facing lay-offs as well.

“We’re the employees that do the processing, and keep the campus safe and clean,” said Jimmie Thompson, the labor relations coordinator for CSEA local 36, which represents SMC employees. “We’re the support staff there, so a lot of the services the college provides will be drastically affected by any reductions to our staff.”

The union has been working without a contract since January when the last one expired.

Thompson, who returned a call Friday from a maternity ward where her daughter was having a baby, accused the college of being too management-heavy. She said while nearly a quarter of the employees the union represents could be let go, not one manager’s job is on the chopping block.

The college does not plan to notice teachers and managers by March 15 that they could be laid off next year, Thompson said. If SMC administrators don’t meet the state mandated deadline, all faculty and administrators are promised full employment next year. However, union employees can be let go with a 30-day notice, Thompson said.

“One of our strategies was to ask the board to give us a level playing field and show us every place they could possibly cut,” Thompson said. “But if they don’t do this by March 15 and notice, their options will be very limited.”

Smith said the college isn’t considering lay-offs on the level of what the union is suggesting. He said no final decisions have been made.

Meanwhile, construction projects stemming from the college’s $160 million modernization bond, which voters approved in 2002, is moving forward. The bond money can only be used for modernization projects, and legally it can’t be put toward offsetting any budget cuts.

“We’re moving ahead with those,” Smith said. “We would be foolish not to. We are going to come out of this eventually.”

Still, there will likely be more classes canceled and Gov. Gray Davis has asked that tuition at all community colleges statewide be increased from $11 to $24 a credit. The Community College Association of California estimates the tuition increase will be too expensive for 206,000 prospective students. “The ramifications are sobering,” Smith said.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 15, 2003.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/021503.pdf?ref=smdp.com)