On Monday, NHTI president Gretchen Mullin-Sawicki confirmed 10 layoffs at the Concord community college – including three professors.
But months earlier, a top official of the Community College System of New Hampshire had pressed lawmakers for more investments that he said could prevent against such staff reductions.
During hearings on the fiscal year 2020-21 budget, Ross Gittell asked for an additional $16 million across the state’s seven colleges, arguing it would help keep staffing levels stable.
“… We’ve requested a budget to meet the needs of increased personnel costs based on present head count,” he told the Senate Finance committee April 30. “To keep present head count, including the full-time/part-time faculty mix that has come up various times in committee.”
A Powerpoint accompanying CCSNH’s budget presentation stated that the budget request was designed around freezing tuition rates and “maintaining personnel needed for programs and services.”
Lawmakers ultimately approved that $16 million bump, passing a budget that included $109.4 million in state support – a 17% increase from last year. That compromise budget was passed and took effect Sept. 27.
But this week’s announced layoffs clashed with that vision. Ten staff members – including four faculty members – will be let go Dec. 27, after enrollment drops for the 2019-20 school year dealt the college a $1.2 million blow, Mullin-Sawicki said.
On Wednesday, Concord-area Democrats seized on Gittell’s characterizations of the money, taking aim at the layoffs in a sharply worded letter to the chancellor and asking that they be reversed.
“This announcement is particularly shocking and disturbing in light of the significant investments made to community colleges in the recently adopted state budget intended to freeze tuition rates and preserve current faculty and staff headcounts,” the letter wrote.
Signed to the bottom of the letter were House Speaker Steve Shurtleff of Penacook; House Finance Chairwoman Mary Jane Wallner of Concord; House Education Chairman Mel Myler of Hopkinton; and Senate Majority Leader Dan Feltes of Concord.
The letter stated that Gittell had presented a misleading picture to lawmakers.
In a statement Thursday, Gittell said the layoffs came out of unforeseen circumstances, and that his words in the spring were being misinterpreted.
“The funding requested by CCSNH was to enable a 2-year freeze on tuition by meeting projected increases in costs based on present headcount and without replacing full-time faculty with adjunct faculty,” Gittell said. “We did not anticipate that our statements would be interpreted to preclude the potential for reductions in response to unanticipated enrollment declines.”
At the time of the requested funding increase, NHTI had budgeted its funds expecting enrollment to stay flat, Gittell said.
Instead, attendance dropped by 8%. That had an immediate financial effect, Gittell argued – one that even a large infusion of money couldn’t counteract.
“Revenue from enrollment – which accounts for 60 percent of our operating revenue – is the variable side of our budget,” Gittell said. “Our staffing and expense control must be responsive to that variability, as a matter of prudent financial stewardship.”
Gittell said that the CCSNH would work to assist those laid off academic staff, including by looking for placements at other colleges in the system. And he said the $16 million increase would help with hiring advisors “to support student retention” and investments in admissions, which he said could help boost enrollment in the long term.
In their letter to him, lawmakers took issue with Gittell’s budget request earlier this year, stating that the likelihood of enrollment drops were known at the time.
“Given that the (CCSNS) was well aware of the trends of declining enrollment at NHTI when it made this representation … we respectfully request that you reconsider the layoffs scheduled for December 27, 2019 or find a way to mitigate the problem with a system-wide approach,” the lawmakers wrote.
Gittell, who said he was staying the course on the layoffs, took a different view of events.
“…In no way did we intend to mislead,” he said.
(Ethan DeWitt can be reached at edewitt@cmonitor.com, at (603) 369-3307, or on Twitter at @edewittNH.)