The Yavapai Community College District Governing Board began its annual budget approval process during a workshop on Feb. 24.
The overall budget won’t be approved until the Tuesday, May 26, Budget Adoption meeting, but the board goes through the information process yearly.
“Yavapai College exists for communities within Yavapai County to have access to and are equipped with the knowledge and skills to improve quality of life,” board Chairwoman Deb McCasland recited from the board packet. “The college will achieve these results at a cost the board believes is justifiable.”
The budget is decided by college employees, overseen by Clint Ewell, Ph.D., the college’s chief operating officer. Then it goes to the Governing Board for discussion, review and eventually, approval.
Board Role
At the start of the meeting, McCasland listed some reminders for her views about the role of the board, especially as it pertains to the budget, approval of which is one of the board’s main functions. She limited discussion to five minutes per member for the duration of the half-day workshop.
Board member William Kiel [District 1] said five minutes wasn’t enough time to go over a multi-million dollar budget with the due diligence he wanted.
McCasland said it was important for the board to operate as a whole, and read from an opinion published to the ACCT Quarterly Magazine by Terry O’Banion about “rogue trustees.”McCasland listed some questions that could “stir something inside you to step back and examine what you are doing as a trustee.”
“No. 1. To what extent does your behavior cause stress and difficulty for the faculty and staff at the college, including the president?” she said. “No. 2. To what extent does your behavior cause stress and difficulty for the other trustees on the board, including the board chair?”
She moved on without questions from the board, except Kiel asking about Policy 308, only saying discussions on specific policies would happen later.
The state has really backed away from its support of community colleges, and we have had to shift our cost to property taxpayers and to our students.
Clint Ewell, Ph.D.
Chief Operating Officer
The board began a discussion on Policy 308, which is the avenue for items to get on the agenda, but postponed further discussion for a policy workshop slated for Wednesday, March 4.
Criticism of O’Banion’s opinions of trustee model note that college “trustees” are individuals appointed or elected to manage assets or guide organizations like nonprofits, foundations or trusts who have a fiduciary duty to act in the organizations best interests, even if that is not in the best interest of the community the organization serves, which stands in contrast to “elected officials” — like Yavapai Community College Governing Board members — who are voted into office by taxpayers to represent constituent interests in government, like a county’s community college. While trustees focus on stewardship and finances, officials focus on policy and serving the public and taxpayers.
Demographics
Ewell gave a presentation about where the college finances are for the current academic year.
“This month is when we spend our time doing a half-day work study session,” he said. “Then in March, we’ll get back together to talk about our capital budgets. April, we’ll look at a draft of the entire budget and receive board feedback. And then in May, we will ask for Board approval of the final budget.”
He began by talking about the demographics of Yavapai County. He said the service area has twice the number of retirement-aged people than average.
“We are in an area with below-average income but above-average cost being driven by high housing cost,’ Ewell said. “We have relatively low availability of health care providers in our service district, which is only exacerbated by our age demographics. And then we are in an environment where technology is moving rapidly, both through automation and artificial intelligence, moving to the Arizona economy.”
Ewell said the college serves about 12,000 students throughout the county, including full-time and part-time students, with about two-thirds being part-time students.
“The median age is 23, meaning that half are the traditional age, and half are above the traditional age. And actually, even within the half that’s under 23 — as we’ll talk about in just a moment — a fair portion of those are now in high school. They’re not 18 to 24, they’re 17 and younger.”
The other half, he said, includes large portions of those in the age groups 25 to 49, and 50 and older.
Finances
“We are accredited by the Higher Learning Commission, which assures sister schools that they can accept credits from our students, because it’s of a known quality, and it gives our students access to federal financial aid,” Ewell said.
Being able to budget becomes tricky when the demographics are different, he said.
“Back in the heyday of creating community colleges, I think that the revenue stream was viewed as a three-legged stool with one-third coming from property taxes, one-third coming from tuition and one-third coming from the state,” Ewell said. “Here in Arizona, the state has really backed away from its support of community colleges, and we have had to shift our cost to property taxpayers and to our students.”
The way to set the budget has to come from as early on in the process as possible.
“I want to point out and remind everybody that the whole thing starts with the board’s priorities,” Ewell said. “So I mean, that is in our current system which the board can elect to change, but in our current policy governance system, the board determines what the priorities of the college are.”
Offerings
The difficulties arise when new technologies, like artificial intelligence, rise faster than they can approve a budget for its instruction. The college uses a three-year strategic plan that grows or changes each year as needed.
“We’re talking about teaching students to ethically applied AI tools throughout the curriculum and to build a college culture where AI is used ethically, confidently and appropriately,” said Lauri Dreher, associate dean of articulation and transfer. “It costs the institution, but also enhances our efficiency and effectiveness at the college. So it’s not just about training our students, but our faculty and staff in using AI tools for productivity.”
The college offers about half general education classes, and half career and technical education classes, Ewell said.
To keep track of where the money comes from and where it goes, the college uses fund accounting.
“Fund accounting is really highlighting where the money comes from and how it’s allowed to be spent. So when you look at our general fund, that’s basically our operating budget. The auxiliary fund is looking at those areas of the college that are not directly educational related, but are related to our educational mission,” he said. “Looking at capital, those are obviously our investments in equipment and facilities. Our next one is debt, which are our loans, and then last but not least, we have our restricted fund, which is all of our gifts and grants that we receive.”
He said the budget overall is 5% smaller than it was last year.
