California State University is anticipating state spending cuts next summer of nearly $400 million and a delay in promised state support of more than $250 million. The projected budget gap may prevent the system from enrolling new students, offering employee raises and spending more money to boost graduation rates.

Cal State’s Board of Trustees heard system senior finance staff detail the grim fiscal outlook Tuesday at a public meeting. They presented figures that show a 2025-26 budget hole of about $400 million to $800 million — a sizable chunk of Cal State’s estimated operating budget of $8.3 billion next year.

“I think we’ve got a lot of broken calculators in Sacramento,” said Trustee Jack McGrory at the hearing. “We’re expected to increase enrollment, fulfill the needs of the labor market and continue to grow the economy, and at the same time, we’re facing these incredibly massive cuts. “What happens to our 500,000 students with these incredibly massive cuts? … We’re talking layoffs. Everybody’s got to face up to that.”

He and others stressed that the system has been in a state of fiscal distress for several years. Last year the trustees indicated that Cal State spends $1.5 billion less than it should to adequately educate its students — a figure that predated the austerity measures that may be on the horizon.

The smaller, $400 million amount is the projected budget hole from mandatory new expenses and state cuts, minus new revenue from the tuition hikes the board approved last year. Those tuition increases — growing 5% annually from this year to at least 2028-29 — aren’t enough to counteract the state cuts that lawmakers said they’d enact next year. The mandatory expenses include $60 million more for health insurance premiums for workers and $55 million in increased financial aid for students.

The proposed $400 million cut is equal to the money the system spends to educate 36,000 students. Cal State enrolled more than 450,000 students last fall.

“What happens to our 500,000 students with these incredibly massive cuts? … We’re talking layoffs. Everybody’s got to face up to that.”
— Jack McGrory, trustee, California State University board

The larger $800 million figure is the budget gap when taking into account spending Cal State feels it should pursue, such as employee raises and more spending on student academic services.

“Cuts would particularly affect the most vulnerable students, limiting their access to academic support tools, advising, counseling and engagement programs,” the agenda document reads. Also at risk is the system’s efforts to improve graduation rates for Black students, a population Cal State has struggled to serve.

A trustees committee approved a budget request to Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday that would largely avoid the projected deficit; the full board is expected to approve it today. In January, Newsom will debut his budget proposal for the next fiscal year. He and lawmakers will negotiate a final budget June of next year.

Why Cal State has a budget problem

That one-two punch of potential cuts and funding delays were spelled out in the budget deal that the Legislature and Newsom finalized this summer. It could have been worse: Initially, Newsom wanted to apply cuts to Cal State this budget year to address California’s multi-billion-dollar deficit. But lawmakers pushed back to buy the university another year to prepare for the cuts and possibly avoid them if the state’s revenue picture brightens. Steve Relyea, the top finance officer at Cal State, said system leaders should get credit for advocating for that reprieve.

Still, Cal State officials are setting a foreboding tone, warning of “severe consequences for students, staff and faculty across all CSU universities” that “could lead to larger class sizes, reduced course offerings, diminished student services, layoffs and hiring freezes,” the system’s 2025-26 budget proposal reads.

Some campuses have already laid off workers this year or plan to. Meghan O’Donnell, a lecturer at Cal State Monterey Bay and a senior officer in the systemwide faculty union, told CalMatters that the jobs of hundreds of lecturers have been totally slashed or reduced because campuses are cutting the overall number of classes they offer.

The lecturer job cuts have occurred at the campuses of Chico, East Bay, Humboldt, Los Angeles, Monterey Bay, San Bernardino, San Francisco and Sonoma. Lecturers have fewer job protections than faculty with tenure or who are on the tenure track.

The union expects to see formal system data about faculty job loss and work reductions in November. O’Donnell said Cal State Monterey Bay put its faculty on layoff notice last year, but the union was able to negotiate and five faculty marked for layoffs instead got voluntary separation agreements. Meanwhile, in her academic department of humanities and communications, four tenured faculty at Monterey Bay took early retirement packages while three others quit and found university jobs outside the Cal State system. Meeting the state’s goals of enrolling a higher number of new students than past years is also at risk, officials said.

“Enrollment growth is very challenging at a time when you’re not getting the resources,” Relyea said. “You can’t bring in additional students if you don’t bring in faculty to teach the students”

Current budget problems

Already the system is working to close an operating deficit of $218 million this academic year — even after new revenue this year from the tuition hikes and some extra state support. It’s a repeat of last year’s situation of ever-higher revenues but even higher expenses. And like last academic year, campuses are coping by pulling from reserves, not filling vacancies and combining under-enrolled classes or outright cutting them.

Several trustees also noted that the system doesn’t adequately sell its story to lawmakers and the public about the impact the reductions have had on the system. “We’ve almost been too effective at making these cuts year over year over year,” said Diego Arambula, vice chair of the board.“A hiring freeze is a hiring freeze, and that does impact students if we’re not bringing someone into a role that we know is important,” he said. “It’s impacting our staff, who are taking on more to try and still meet the needs of the students who are here.”

“No organization can survive with that level of budget cut.”
— Tomás D. Morales, campus president, CSU San Bernardino

Meanwhile, eight campuses are working with even less money because the system began its plan of pulling some funding from schools that are missing enrollment targets by at least 10%. Cal State leadership rerouted the money to nine schools with growing enrollments. Those eight campuses are down a combined $21 million this year — with San Francisco State getting hit the hardest by losing $6 million.

Relyea said the campuses are facing the prospect of pulling money from academic services to afford keeping the lights on. “If you’re going to delay maintaining that electrical system, there’s a risk. Are you going to take that risk? How does that compare to the risk of not funding student counselors.

Even campus presidents with enrollment growth say they’re struggling. San Jose State has cut $55 million from its budget the past two years, in part by not hiring new staff and avoiding replacing non-faculty job openings, its president, Cynthia Teniente-Matson, told the trustees.

To raise revenue, the campus is enrolling 300 new non-resident students — who pay much more in tuition — in majors that aren’t over-enrolled, she said.

Cal State San Bernardino had an average operating budget of $266 million until last year. Now it’s eyeing an average operating budget of $217 million if next year’s expected cuts come through. “No organization can survive with that level of budget cut,” the campus president, Tomás D. Morales, told the trustees.

The system’s reserves also aren’t enough to ride out a large multi-year deficit. Cal State campuses have a combined $777 million in one-time funds saved for economic hardships — enough to sustain operations for about a month. The system’s goal is to have enough saved for at least three months of operations. Other reserves of about $1.5 billion are meant for debt payments, financial aid and contracts.

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CalMatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.

Many students start community college with the hope of getting an associate degree and then transferring to a four-year institution, such as a California State University or University of California campus.

But a state audit, released Tuesday, found that the vast majority of these students never accomplish their goal. “Only about 1 in 5 students who began community college from 2017 to 2019 and intended to transfer did so within four years,” the audit states. Transfer rates are even lower for students in less affluent parts of the state and in rural areas and for students who are Black or Hispanic, according to the audit.

The state’s higher education systems are designed so that students can spend two years at community college, two years at a university, and then graduate with a bachelor’s degree. Tuition at community college is cheaper than at any Cal State or UC campus, so in theory, a student who follows this path is saving money.

In practice, few students ultimately transfer and those who do take so long to do it that they lose out on any potential savings.

Without a bachelor’s degree, career prospects are often dim. Many jobs require a bachelor’s degree, and on average, young adults with a bachelor’s degree earn $16,000 more than those with only an associate degree. Adults with only a high school education earn the least on average.

In 2022, Gov. Gavin Newsom set a goal to increase the percentage of working-age adults with a postsecondary degree or certificate from 55% to 70% by 2030. Improving the transfer process is critical to reaching that goal, the audit states.

The community college transfer maze

The transfer system is too complex, the audit says, and numerous studies have found that bureaucracy is partially to blame. Students who want to transfer face a maze of administrative hurdles and esoteric requirements — akin to a game of chutes and ladders.

“California community college students who want to transfer to a four-year college or university are trying to make progress, but one bad roll of the dice can set them back several turns,” said a June 2021 report by the Campaign for College Opportunity, a nonprofit organization.

Some Cal State and UC majors don’t accept certain community college courses, and some community colleges don’t offer the classes that students need. The Cal State and UC systems have different requirements for community college transfer students, and some students — even students who meet the requirements — get rejected, the audit found.

While most community college students who apply to a UC or Cal State get accepted, popular majors, such as computer science, and popular schools, such as UCLA and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, are far more selective, the audit found. If rejected, these students are supposed to go through a “redirection” process, where they get accepted to another campus. The state audit found that the CSU redirected more than 25,000 community college applicants to other campuses over the last few years.

In 2010, California lawmakers reformed the transfer process by creating a new kind of community college degree that also guarantees admission to a Cal State campus. Known as the Associate Degree for Transfer, it’s become increasingly popular and a key benefit to students, according to the audit.

Lawmakers tried — and failed — to have the UC system guarantee admissions for these community college students. Last year, lawmakers made a breakthrough by passing a bill that will require UCLA to prioritize certain community college students for admission beginning in the 2026-27 academic year. More UC campuses will participate in later years.

The state has also pushed the community college system to standardize how it labels courses to make it easier for students to determine what they need to transfer. Implementing the new system has been slow, however, and it won’t be complete until 2027.

The last major reform will go into effect next year. Beginning in the fall semester, the community college system will offer a new set of common prerequisites that both the UC and Cal State systems have agreed to accept.

But the audit found that these reforms alone are insufficient. Auditors recommended that community college campuses find ways to increase the number of counselors who can support transfer-bound students and that all three higher education systems should work to expand successful programs, such as the Associate Degree for Transfer.

When collaboration is ‘ineffective’

When California designed its current higher education system in 1960, it required both the Cal State and UC systems to make room for community college transfers. The UC system agrees to admit one transfer student for every two new freshmen who enroll, but it didn’t meet that goal last year, said UC spokesperson Stett Holbrook. Part of the problem, he said, is that community college enrollment declined.

The Cal State system doesn’t have a specific goal, but the audit said most campuses still enroll a high number of transfer students. The largest exception is Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, where just 18% of incoming students came through the transfer system in recent years.

In 2017, the community college system set a goal to increase the annual number of students who transfer from about 80,000 to just over 100,000 by 2022. The system never achieved that goal, and the pandemic is in part to blame, the audit states.

Paul Feist, a spokesperson for the California Community College Chancellor’s Office, said the next goal is contingent on whether the Cal State and UC campuses can boost their own enrollment.

One challenge with the transfer process is that it requires the community college, Cal State, and UC systems to work together. Historically, that hasn’t been easy.

When the state Legislature allowed the community college system to begin offering their own bachelor’s degrees — a solution that avoids the transfer process altogether — professors at the Cal State campuses fought back, fearing that community colleges might siphon away students and force the Cal State system to lose money.

Each system has a different set-up: The UC is constitutionally independent, which means the Legislature has limited authority over it. The Cal State system is centralized, whereas the community college system is more similar to the K-12 system, where regional college districts make the majority of decisions.

There’s no official coordinating committee between the three public higher education systems. Such a committee did exist over a decade ago, but former Gov. Jerry Brown stopped funding it “because he believed it had been ineffective,” the audit wrote.

The audit didn’t call for a new committee but it did ask all three higher education systems to improve how they share data and information.

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Adam Echelman covers California’s community colleges in partnership with Open Campus, a nonprofit newsroom focused on higher education.

CalMatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.

Sandy was born on July 28, 1944, in Sacramento to Robert and Ida Albert. She sadly passed away on Sept. 19, 2024, at her home in Ferndale, with her family by her side.

Sandy was raised in Humboldt County, first living in Ferndale then moving to Fields Landing when her dad bought a commercial fishing boat. She graduated from Eureka High class of 1962.

Her parents Robert and Ida owned the Argo fishing boat in Fields Landing, where they had their crab stand. That is where Sandy and her siblings spent most of their time working and learning how to crack crab. Sandy blew her siblings out of the water by being the best crab picker there was.

Sandy met Don Katri at a very young age while working at a square-dancing event. Later in life they met again in high school, which lead to them getting married in July 1963 and later having their three children — Rob, Brian and Kim. They first lived in the Bay Area for the first years of their marriage then they moved and spent the last 37 years of their marriage on the family farm in Ferndale. She spent her working days for DHHS-SSB, where she retired in 2009.

She loved everyone she met. She loved going on adventures such as going camping with her family, and she and her husband going on cruises every year after they both retired from the county, hitting all the casinos from Oregon to California. She took many trips to Reno and Las Vegas with her brother Jim and sister-in-law Sharon. Her favorite month was in August, due to the horse races in Ferndale. Everyone who worked with Sandy knew when it was August due to her taking one week off to go to the races.

She is survived by her husband of 61 years, Don Katri. Her children Rob (Julie) Katri, Brian Katri and her daughter Kim “bug” Miranda. Her grandkids Chris (Rosie) Katri, Megan ( Lindsay) Katri and Brandon Katri. Travis, Whitney, and Sammy Katri. Blake (Katrina) Miranda, Mikayla (soon to be Mrs. Riley Harris) Logan Miranda and Tegan Rumley. And her one and only great-grandson Radley Miranda.

She is also survived by her twin sister Sharon (Dennis) Decarli, her two sisters-in-law Josie Dunnigan, and Barbie Albert. Along with her numerous nieces and nephews. She is proceeded in death by her parents Robert and Ida Albert, her in laws Charles and Ida Katri and her two brothers Jim and Frank Albert along with numerous other family members.

We are going to have a private family service. The family of Sandy would like to give a huge thank you to Hannah and Itzel from Hospice of Humboldt for everything they have done for her and us.

Rochelle (Shelly) Honig passed away peacefully at home on July 3, 2024 at 81, after a courageous battle with pulmonary disease. She was a dedicated stay-at-home mom, a compassionate public health nurse, an enthusiastic farmer at the local farmers markets and a master gardener.

Gardening was one of Shelly’s greatest joys; she cultivated not only her own garden but also shared her bounty with local food banks, embodying her commitment to community service. Above all, Shelly was immensely proud of her five children, who grew into outstanding adults, carrying forward her values of kindness and resilience. She loved her farm animals, particularly her chickens and goats.

Shelly was born on November 14, 1942 in Kansas City, Mo., and grew up in Middletown, Conn.. After high school, she attended the University of Connecticut, where she earned bachelor and master’s degrees in biology. Her first job was at the (prestigious) Sloan Kettering Cancer Research Institute in New York City, where she worked until her first marriage to Jay Davis. She helped her husband through medical school working in a cancer-research lab at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

In 1975, she arrived in Humboldt County with her first-born, Jenny, and very pregnant with Adam. She and her then-husband were looking for a good place to raise their children (who would soon include a third, Emily) where they could “get back to the land.” She was initially a stay-at-home mom—kept busy by three active young children, also by hosting a 4-H group, baking healthy breads, and growing a huge garden where she raised food for her young family and numerous gophers.

When her first marriage ended after 20 years, Shelly earned a nursing degree at Humboldt, and met Ron Honig. They were married in 1994 and blended their families, and Shelly became a step-mom to Hilary and Madeline. They enlarged the house, and Shelly began working as a public health nurse. Shelly continued her life long quest of learning by taking up hobbies, chief of which was to study the Jewish religion and became active in the local Jewish community. She and Ron also managed the large apple orchard that had been planted on their two-plus acres.

They could be seen at the Arcata Farmer’s Market providing apples, apple butter and apple-cider vinegar — as well as eggs from a decent-sized flock of chickens. She and Ron became familiar faces and many of their customers became friends.

In 1999, she first became a grandmother (Zoe), and seven other grandkids followed (Malcolm, Savannah, Gage, Graham, Hadley, Sawyer, and Milo).

After a long-ish illness, she died peacefully in her own home on July 3, 2024, after three days in Hospice Care. She has left an empty spot for those of us who knew and loved her. She would not have wanted flowers or donations in her name. Rather, she’d have asked you to be kind to somebody you don’t know.

Shelly’s spirit will be remembered fondly by all who knew her. She leaves behind a legacy of love, compassion, and dedication to her family and community. A LIFE WELL LIVED.

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Press release from the U.S. Coast Guard:

A Coast Guard helicopter aircrew medically evacuated an 8-year-old male off the cruise ship Royal Princess approximately 20 miles west of Eureka, Tuesday.

Coast Guard Sector Humboldt Bay watchstanders received notification at approximately 7 a.m. from Sector Columbia River relaying a request from the Royal Princess, stating that an 8-year-old male passenger onboard was diagnosed with appendicitis and needed to be medevaced.

Sector Humboldt Bay watchstanders then coordinated the launch of an MH-65 Dolphin helicopter aircrew around 8 a.m.

The aircrew arrived on-scene, hoisted the passenger along with his family into the helicopter, and transferred him to emergency medical services at Saint Joseph Hospital in Eureka around 9:40 a.m.

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PREVIOUSLY: County Supes Approve Civil Penalities on ‘Yee Haw’ Communal Living Property Near Trinidad

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For the past quarter-century or so, there have been two wildly divergent perspectives on the communal living property near Trinidad known as “Yee Haw.”

A stovepipe chimney emerges from hog-wire fencing in the window of a modified vehicle on the Yee Haw property. | Photo from county staff presentation.

Many of the dozens if not hundreds of people who’ve lived there — nestled in “hippie-rigged” shacks and tarp-draped old vehicles among the redwoods — see it as a sanctuary, an idyllic “intentional community” where people live close to nature. And they see the free-spirited owner, Charles Garth, as a benevolent figure whose generosity has saved them from homelessness.

But for county employees who work in code enforcement, public and environmental health, Yee Haw represents a long-standing collection of serious hazards to public health and safety, including unsanitary sewage disposal, stockpiles of junk vehicles and detritus, and inhabited structures that don’t meet any building, plumbing, electrical or public safety codes. These officials are more inclined to see Garth as recalcitrant slumlord who has consistently failed to bring his property up to snuff.

Those two divergent perspectives have been a source of conflict since the first “Notice of Nuisance” was served on the property back in May of 2001, and they came crashing together again at today’s meeting of the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors, where county staff laid out a 39-week plan to either coerce Garth into getting his parcel up to code or else proceed with tenant eviction and abatement measures, including environmental cleanup as well as demolition and removal of un-permitted structures.

In a staff presentation, Code Enforcement Manager Dean Beck offered a history of the property, located at 473 Quarry Road, and noted that Humboldt County Superior Court last year upheld $45,000 in civil penalties plus more than $17,000 in administrative costs. A lien on the property was recorded two years ago, and Garth has yet to make a single payment on that debt.

When county inspectors last conducted a full inspection, in 2021, they found that none of the code violations had been remedied. As he showed a series of photos, Beck mentioned unsafe stairways, improperly installed wood stoves, standing barrels presumably filled with human waste, RVs powered by unprotected extension cords and families living in structures that don’t meet minimum safety standards.

Previous code enforcement efforts were delayed or stymied due to court appeals, the death of local attorney Ed Denson (who represented Garth) and efforts to find alternative solutions. But now the county needs to act, Beck said, and staff has proposed a schedule that allows time for an appeal hearing, further legal appeals, tenant relocation, warrants and permits. 

“If all goes as outlined, county abatement may begin in June of 2025,” Beck said. He noted that the county previously received a bid for abatement, including removal of structures and disposal of junk vehicles, of more than $306,000, which represents more than 60 percent of his department’s annual abatement fund.

Humboldt County Planning and Building Director John Ford said staff has had discussions with Garth about possible remedies, including the potential to qualify this community as an emergency housing village, but no clear solution has been found. And every time staff works on this issue, the administrative costs continue to accumulate.

In the ensuing board discussion, Supervisor Steve Madrone, whose Fifth District includes Yee Haw, expressed sympathy for both Garth and his tenants, noting lack of affordable housing in the larger community and vouching for the efficacy of composting toilets, among other points. And he advocated for continuing to search for alternatives to eviction and code enforcement.

Madrone suggested that Garth’s efforts represent a laudable private-party attempt to address homelessness.

“Are there issues with solid waste, abandoned vehicles and other things? Certainly,” he said. “Are there some conditions that a lot of people would think are substandard? Certainly. But I’ve been in this community of people and on site many, many times — as recently as about four months ago — and I know progress is being made.”

Madrone theorized that Garth, who recently purchased a Trinidad property that includes an old church, might be able to qualify as an operator of an emergency housing village, which, per county code, must be operated by a nonprofit or religious institution. “Becoming a church is not that difficult,” Madrone said.

Another un-permitted structure at Yee Haw.

But Ford pointed out that the structures on the property would still need to meet building and safety codes. He also noted that these latest enforcement efforts were complaint-driven.

Third District Supervisor Mike Wilson was a bit more skeptical of Garth’s good-faith efforts, observing that if he had enough money to buy property in Trinidad he probably could afford to remediate some of the problems at Yee Haw. 

“From a public health perspective, our job is to prevent outbreaks, not to wait and respond to an outbreak of something … ,” Wilson said. “Something has to change.”

First District Supervisor and Board Chair Rex Bohn agreed, saying that if the county kicks this matter down the road any farther, then “there is no reason to have a code enforcement or an abatement process.” He later said that while he understands the need to provide housing for those facing homelessness, “I can’t see where anytime there’s going to be a housing shortage that bad where we throw all the environmental and safety and health standards the window.”

During the public comment period, a series of current and former residents of Yee Haw offered passionate defenses of the community and urged the county not to evict them.

“It’s between Yee Haw and the street,” one man said.

“We are solving homelessness, houselessness at Yee Haw,” another man said, “and we have been doing it for 38 years, and we’ve been doing it better than the county, with less money.”

An older woman who lives there described the property as “a really wonderful place” and said she’s “thrilled to be there.”

Another woman said, “I know from outside perspective we look like a bunch of dirty hippies. I have come to absolutely love this community and love my my cabin and my commune [and] my fellow people that I live here.” She said she looks forward to the county’s coming inspection. “I am excited to show you how much we have done and tried to grow as a community.”

Nichole Norris, a former employee of Denson’s who has worked to advocate for Yee Haw residents while also reporting about the issue for Kym Kemp’s Redheaded Blackbelt, said she now lives on the property. 

“I recently had to move there because I’m a single mom, and the [county] services that they provide for emergency housing, I sat on a list for over a year, and my son and I were going to have to sleep in our car, and Charles Garth saved us,” Norris said.

When Garth himself addressed the board he said that the photos of his property that had been displayed were “ancient” and that county staff had misrepresented the history of events. But he said he can definitely work with the county to address issues onsite.

Mario Kalson, the county’s director of environmental health, appeared via Zoom and said that his department does not have any wastewater treatment or septic system permits on file for the Yee Haw property, and he said there are “fundamental problems” with allowing waterless toilets for such a large number of residents at the property, which is zoned agriculture general (AG), meaning no more than two housing units are allowed.

Madrone quibbled with that assessment and again spoke about the merits of composting toilets, and the two went back and forth about the feasibility of them at Yee Haw.

Second District Supervisor Michelle Bushnell thanked the public for their feedback while suggesting that they look to Garth to take responsibility for keeping them from homelessness. Addressing him directly, she added, “To the landowner, please … these folks are really depending on you.”

Wilson said that while he’s sensitive to the fact that this is a class issue — with people who own their homes discussing the fate of people on the verge of homelessness — it’s important to have “equitable enforcement” of health and safety codes.

Bohn said he’s fine with the 39-week schedule that staff has laid out, especially given the two decades-plus that these issues have persisted. 

Ultimately, the board voted to accept the staff report, effectively giving a green light to this 39-week plan toward eviction and abatement, though as Ford noted there will be “an opportunity for an off-ramp” from that plan: namely, if Garth pursues a rezone and general plan amendment while making substantial progress toward removing junk vehicles and addressing the code violations.

“But if there’s not progress being made, and if things are not moving ahead, then we will stay on the path to towards removing everything from the site that’s not legal,” Ford said.

Before wrapping up for the day, however, Madrone called Garth back up to the lectern and proceeded to read the list of code violations, asking him to respond “yes” or “no” to the question of whether he’s willing and able to remedy each one. Garth argued a bit about the merits of a few of the items but ultimately said he’ll do what’s necessary. 

Crap! It would seem that LoCO is late to the game when it comes to conducting polls about Eureka’s Measure F. You better believe this is embarrassing to us! Never you fear, though. We plan to make up for lost time today in the dumbest way possible.

Stretch out your voting thumbs, friends. It’s POLLZ time.

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ONE MORE POLL TO GO

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Thank you for playing, Humboldt! As a reward for sticking with us, you have earned a heaping pile of MOO DENG. And don’t forget to vote!