Cabrillo College facing major cuts

Cabrillo College is being forced to cut 70 of its 1,394 classes and $4.5 million from its $89.3 million budget as a result of low attendance and state funding cuts.

The cuts amounting to 5% of its budget and classes came as a surprise this week when the state declined to fund teaching units dropped when nine faculty members retired. Up to now, the state has funded new staff when teachers left.

The school joins many others facing declining enrollment and a budget for the 2025-26 school year that does not include a cost-of-living adjustment.

Those effects will be felt soon, said Cabrillo President Matt Wetstein, adding the cuts will largely affect math and English courses—although other areas such as art will feel the sting, too. Next week, Cabrillo officials will begin considering how to cut the college’s budget, Wetstein said.

“It’s hard to envision a budget without a cost of living adjustment for the most expensive place in the world to rent or buy a home,” Wetstein said. “That’s devastating for our students and our employees. That’s the kind of future we’re facing and trying to plan for.”

Part of the problem, Wetstein said, is that emergency funding sources that came to Cabrillo during the Covid-19 pandemic, and after the CZU fires, are ending. And while the college is applying for an extension on that, there is no guarantee it will come.

Also, the state’s Student-Centered Funding Formula gives more to colleges that serve low-income students and those working toward a degree or transfer to a four-year university.

That puts Cabrillo College—which has high numbers of older students taking single classes—at a financial disadvantage, Wetstein said.

“We’re in a situation with a budget deficit, and an uncertain funding level for the coming year,” he said. “In order to help balance the budget, there are faculty positions that are not getting replaced pretty much throughout the college in various departments.”

The college has 185 full-time faculty. But with declining enrollment, the college currently has more than is needed, and above the state-required minimum, said Cabrillo spokeswoman Kristin Fabos.

Last year, around 12,000 students were enrolled, compared to 2018 when that number was closer to 15,000.

Much of that loss came during the pandemic, and the college has been clawing its way back, increasing 4% every year since then. 

But Wetstein does not envision a return to previous levels of enrollment any time soon.

The decline is caused in part by an exodus of residents to better economic climes.

Only about 200 of the 900 homes lost during the CZU fires have been rebuilt, Wetstein said.

A similar trend is also happening in Pajaro in the wake of the 2023 floods.

Wetstein fears “there is a lost amount of enrollment from the Pajaro flood that we’re never going to get back.”

It is not yet clear what specific classes will be cut. The department deans will soon have to make that determination, Wetstein said.

“I think it’s going to be a position-by-position determination on whether we do a rehire for a particular job,” he said. 

Wetstein stressed that Cabrillo is still on a positive trend, an assertion evidenced by the Oct. 21 announcement by the financial technology company Smart Asset naming the school the best community college in the state, and 37th in the U.S.  

“We do great work and I don’t want to lose that fact,” he said. “It’s often hard for faculty and staff to go through periods like this, and I don’t want people to lose sight of how great this institution is.”