State may cut CC funds

Clarendon College would not be seriously impacted if state officials carry through with a possible five percent budget cut.

Gov. Rick Perry, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, and House Speaker Joe Straus sent letters to state agencies and institutions of higher learning directing each state agency to submit a plan to identify savings for the 2010-2011 biennium.

But CC President Bill Auvenshine doesn’t think the college has much to worry about.

“This is a pre-panic,” Auvenshine said. “The comptroller has said Texas was the last going into the recession, and she believes it will be the first to come out of it.
“Other states are really suffering. Arizona is asking agencies to cut 30 percent.”

College officials had heard rumors before Christmas of a possible ten percent cut, Texas is now looking at five percent, and Auvenshine believes the final cut, if it comes, will be less than that.

“They did this in 2003,” he said. “They asked for ten percent and ended up at three percent.”

Five percent would amount to about $200,000 coming out of the college’s budget, but Auvenshine said CC did well in its last appropriation and that it can deal with the cut if it has to without cutting personnel.

“We met with staff members this week and asked them to look where they could cut in their budgets,”

Auvenshine said. “Deferring maintenance projects is the most likely thing. We’ve done that before.”

The letter from the state requests CC submit a plan identifying savings no later than February 15, 2010.