Your guide to NYC's public proceedings.
AGENCY TESTIMONY
Program to Eliminate the Gap (PEG) and its effects
0:23:29
ยท
67 sec
Batista explains the significant impact of the Program to Eliminate the Gap (PEG) on CUNY's budget, particularly for community colleges. He emphasizes the importance of restoring these funds to maintain essential student services.
- PEG restoration not included in the preliminary budget
- Baseline PEG for FY2026 estimated to grow to $95.5 million (15% of CUNY's operating budget)
- Significant impact on community colleges
- Affects academic advisement, financial aid, counseling, library hours, and facility maintenance
- Importance of these services highlighted by recent FAFSA rollout issues
Hector Batista
0:23:29
Now the PACS restoration is not included in the preliminary budget.
0:23:33
The baseline PEG for fiscal year twenty twenty six is estimated to grow to $95,500,000, which represents 15% of the entire contribution of our operating budget.
0:23:44
The PEG's had had a continue to have a significant impact on CUNY community college.
0:23:50
As we testified last year, the PEGs have had an impact on everything from academic advisement, financial aid, counseling, library hours, facility maintenance, and more.
0:24:02
These critical net networks are essential for CUNY ability to attract and retain students.
0:24:09
We all witnessed the flawed and rollout of the free application federal student aid or FAFSA.
0:24:14
The university across the country were scrambling around to engage students in their enrollment to make sure that they didn't have an impact.
0:24:23
This had a shock to a lot of those those systems.
0:24:26
Counselors are extremely important to making sure that these students are able to get the financial aid information that they need in order to remain in school.
0:24:37
Our top priority for this budget cycle is to restore as much of the pegs as possible.