Maricopa County Community College To Hold Meetings On District 'Transformation'

By Casey Kuhn
Published: Monday, November 28, 2016 - 5:05am
Image Courtesy of Maricopa County Community College District

With an annual budget of more than $1 billion, the Maricopa County Community College District is one of the largest community college districts in the country.

Now, the governing board is holding its first special meeting today to discuss what they’re calling a time of transformation.

That transformation, as written in a resolution by the board, is to make the district leaner, more productive and more responsive to the community.

The board’s first meeting today is to read, discuss and hear public comment on the new resolution, which includes “streamlining administration to eliminate unnecessary redundancy” and personnel adjustments, like reductions in staff.

Board President Alfredo Gutierrez said the changes are 50 years in the making.

“We have no state funding. And so we really can’t delay," Gutierrez said. "We can’t lollygag, we can’t over-consider, we’ve got to begin to make changes that make sense."

He said the meetings are designed to inform and listen to what the public thinks about the changes.

“It allows the public to understand that a system they’ve come to know and has been in place for 50 years, is going to be in place in the future but it may not have the precise configuration that it did in the past,” Gutierrez said.

The hearing will be from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Glendale Civic Center. The next special board meeting will be Dec. 5 in Mesa.