Butler County Community College

BUTLER TWP — The impact of a 2% raise in community college funding in the 2024 state budget was dashed when lawmakers left the session without passing fiscal code language releasing the funds to the Pennsylvania Department of Education.

Now, community college leaders, including those at Butler County Community College, are making a push to receive the $260 million earmarked for the 15 community colleges in the state, so they won’t have to draw on emergency funds that will accrue heavy interest payments, cutting into that 2% raise.

“The community colleges, the 15 of us and the Commission for Community Colleges, are putting on a full-court press to receive these funds,” said BC3 president Nick Neupauer. “We are doing everything that we can as an institution to maintain normal operations protecting our students, faculty and staff.”

In his report at a meeting of the college’s Council of Trustees on Wednesday afternoon, Dec. 6, Neupauer read from a news article by Spotlight PA regarding the delay in passing fiscal codes by state legislators that would release money earmarked for the Department of Education.

Neupauer said the 2024 budget allocated $260 million to community colleges in the state, a 2% increase over the previous year. The money is usually distributed to community colleges in quarterly payments, and the last check went out in June. Neupauer said two quarterly payments will probably not be delivered on time because of the delay in lawmakers passing fiscal code, and it could be March before the colleges get the missing payments.

The state Senate will convene Dec. 11 but fiscal code is not on its posted agenda. The state House has a non-voting session Dec. 10. The next noted session for both bodies is Jan. 2, according to the Pennsylvania General Assembly’s website.

Jim Hrabosky, vice president for administration and finance at BC3, said the college rarely, if ever, draws money from its reserves. He is also preparing to draw more credit to pay for operating costs while the college is waiting for state payments — a costly method of maintaining operations.

“We’ve never gone this long before,” Hrabosky said. “I have opened up discussions to immediately increase that line (of credit) from $1 million to between $3 and $4 million.

“The only problem with that is interest rates aren’t 2% or 3% anymore. If we fully draw that down, we’ll be paying 9% or 10% to access these funds. That will cost the college about $30,000 a month.”

Hrabosky also said the college book store has about $1 million that BC3 also could draw on to pay bills while the college is waiting for state payments.

Neupauer said community colleges are in the state budget under the same line item as libraries, but also money for school vouchers. According to Neupauer, separating that grouping has been a topic the legislature has considered in the past.

“It is unfortunate that we are attached to it,” Neupauer said. “The (Pennsylvania) Commission for Community Colleges has worked on strategies to separate that in a Senate bill, House bill and even working with other entities.”

Kim Geyer, Butler County commissioner and a BC3 trustee, said at the meeting that money from the county has been fast tracked to BC3 and the Butler County Federated Library System.

“The county has agreed to advance the contribution that would be in March to February to help the college,” Geyer said. “The county also contacted the Federated Library System to tell them the same.”

Community college leaders from around the state are in solidarity, according to Neupauer, in agreeing to keep normal operations going while they wait for the fiscal code to be enacted. Students, he said, will not feel the strain.

“As a group, the 15 community colleges have agreed not to cut academic expenses to protect students, faculty and staff,” Neupauer said, “which means colleges are either taking out expensive loans or tucking into financial reserves to make ends meet.”

With projections showing that state money won’t reach community colleges until March, Hrabosky said administrators are making plans to operate for months without that state funding.

“If we get into March, it’s going to be really, really tricky,” Hrabosky said. “I’m here to assure everyone that if we handle everything that I have outlined, we will be fine. We will be fine liquidity-wise, we will be able to continue to pay our vendors and pay our payroll — those are our biggest concerns.”