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LACCD

Los Angeles Community College District
(LACCD)

Situation:

For over 77 years LACCD, the largest community college district in the country, has offered educational opportunities to students in more than 36 communities covering over 882 square miles.

LACCD educates almost three times as many Latino students and nearly four times as many African-American students as all of the University of California campuses combined. In 2006, eighty percent of LACCD students were from underserved populations.

In 1998 LACCD hired McCallum Group as their Sacramento lobbyist.

Challenges & Opportunities:

Prior to engaging McCallum Group, the LACCD had experienced a great deal of negative press, financial challenges, a dysfunctional central bureaucracy/governance process, and declining student enrollments.

In the process of analyzing the LACCD situation, McCallum Group documented that:

  • LACCD’s participation rate was ½ that of the statewide average.
  • Compared to the rest of California’s community colleges, LACCD’s funded Full Time Equivalent Students (FTES) per 100 residents had lagged since 1981/82.   
  • Although LACCD had nearly 10% of the system’s students, it received only a small share of the capital outlay funding going to California Community Colleges.

Outcomes (as of 11-6-06)

  • Increased actual growth funding for LACCD by obtaining change in Board of Governors growth formula.
  • LACCD received $8 million via a $27 million augmentation in the 2004-05 Budget for districts with persistent levels of unfunded FTES.
  • Increased LACCD’s FTES from 74,769 in 1997/98 to 99,710 in 2004/05 (an increase of 24,941 FTES) by successfully advocating for improved community college funding in the State Budget. That increase is greater than the 2005-06 FTES of 61 out of the 71 other community college districts in California.
  • Governor signed SB 361 (Scott), which will improve and stabilize community college funding for LACCD and other districts, and is projected to provide LACCD with $4.3 million in equalization funding.
  • Successfully lobbied for $80 million in new buildings for LACCD, including two health sciences buildings, classrooms, and four child development centers.
  • Obtained legislation authorizing LACCD and 2 other California community college districts to enter into design-build contracts, saving the district time and money.
  • In November of 2006, public voted to approve Proposition 1D, which provides $1.5 billion – 48% of higher education bond proceeds – for California Community College facilities and extends LACCD’s design-build authority.

Process:

  • Led an external strategic planning conference for LACCD leadership in September 1998 that developed proposals to improve (a) internal governance; (b) facilities; (c) revenue; and (d) internal and external community relations and communication. 
  • Introduced a number of LACCD-sponsored bills to address LACCD’s unfunded growth and outdated facilities, including:

            AB 8 (Cardenas), 1999
            SB 1283 (Polanco), 1999
            AB 734 (Romero), 2002
            SB 737 (Alarcon), 2002
            AB 1000 (Simitian), 2002
            AB 2825 (Firebaugh), 2004
            AB 1492 (Evans), 2005

  • Came up with idea to focus on fact that LACCD educates 3 times more Latinos and 4 times more African Americans as all of the University of California campuses combined.
  • Made other districts with unfunded FTES aware of the issue and educated Legislators on the issue as well.
  • Advocated for adequate enrollment growth funding in state’s annual budget.
  • Proposed budget augmentations and budget language that provided additional growth funding and increased Legislators’ awareness of LACCD’s growth issue.
  • Assisted in identifying candidates for the position of Chancellor of the Los Angeles Community College District.
  • Lobbied for change in statewide bond measure which increased – from $15 per $100,000 valuation to $25 per $100,000 valuation – the amount that community colleges could seek via passage of a local bond measure, allowing LACCD to increase the amount of its local bond.
  • Successfully advocated for AB 16 (2002) Education facilities: Kindergarten-University Public Education Facilities Bond Acts of 2002 and 2004, which provided 40% of higher education bond funds to California Community Colleges.
  • Further increased the California Community College (CCC) share of the higher education bond proceeds to 48% in AB 127, the Kindergarten-University Public Education Facilities Bond Act of 2006.
  • Suggested creation of Californians for Community Colleges and introduction of a community college initiative that would improve and stabilize community college funding, improve governance, and reduce student fees; campaign is in the process of gathering signatures to qualify the ballot initiative.
  • Documented the impact of which base year was used for equalization, and advocated for use of the most recent data rather than an outdated base year.
  • Advocated for passage of SB 361(Scott), which replaced old program-based funding model with a better model and improved the growth formula to better reflect actual growth.     
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