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Q&A
Discussion on $15 million operational support for community colleges
0:44:33
·
103 sec
Council Member Eric Dinowitz inquires about the allocation of $15 million in operational support for community colleges in the executive budget. CUNY CFO Sherif Soliman explains the funding's purpose and potential uses.
- The $15 million is one-time funding for fiscal year 2026
- Last year's allocation was based on full-time equivalent students
- Potential uses include support for immigrant students, academic advisors, financial aid counselors, and library hours
Eric Dinowitz
0:44:33
Executive budget, so on to operational and the expense side, or back to the expense side.
0:44:39
The executive plan includes an additional 15,000,000 in fiscal twenty six for operational support for community colleges.
0:44:45
This is one time funding.
0:44:48
And what are these funds allocated for?
0:44:51
How are they divided among campuses?
0:44:54
And how are those decisions made for this one time funding?
Sherif Soliman
0:44:58
Sure.
0:44:58
Thank you for the question.
0:45:00
So last year was the first time the 15,000,000 one time was allocated.
0:45:07
Clearly at that time, we still had baseline pegs, so it took the baseline peg to 80,000,000.
0:45:13
The community colleges still have a structural deficit of about $21,000,000.
0:45:18
So that 15,000,000 was allocated out last year to the community colleges based on full time equivalent in terms of students.
0:45:26
We're putting the money where the students are.
0:45:28
Right?
0:45:29
This year, with the restoration of the baseline pegs plus that 15,000,000, it opens up new opportunities to look at things anew.
0:45:37
Again, as the chancellor mentioned, we may look at bolstering up some of the support for for our immigrant students, some of the other supports on academic advisors, financial aid counselors.
0:45:48
We'll look at library hours.
0:45:50
We'll look at the whole, you know, spectrum of different opportunities to make investments.
0:45:57
It's one time fund that's not recurring, so we want to make sure that we emphasize, as we always do, to be cautious about PS expenditures with respect to one time funds, but all in all, it's gonna help.
0:46:10
And and we're gonna look anew again at the at the PEG restoration plus that one time to see what kind of investments we can make.