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As with everywhere else, there is a strong budget constraint limiting higher education scenario in California too. According to librarians here, there is a shock waiting for them as they return to the campus after vacation. Situation is as good as the dark ages where research funding which has been essentially fund the research databases is cut down by almost hundred percent.

Campuses will be completely lost without ProQuest, Ebsco, Gale or any other electronic resources. The only alternative now for everyone is to turn to Wikipedia and Google for research information. There are certain fortunate campuses with excellent and supportive leadership. These campuses may continue receiving partial research funding from the local general funds. However, this too is expected to be very limited.

Community colleges in California numbers at least 110 where 2.6 million students study. This is in fact, one of the largest systems in the world. Like any other program, the current recession has impacted the field of academia too, which is evident if you notice the economic situation in California. The community college system relies entirely on state funding and the past year has seen cuts that are unrecoverable. The measly deferred funding received from the State has been forcing campuses to use their resource funds in order to combat fixed costs including staff payroll. The gloomy part is this situation is all set to continue for quite a while now.
 
According to the July 28th 2009 state budget, spending of community colleges will have to be cut by $680 million from the amount sanctioned in February. This will lead to reduced student enrolment, by at least 250,000. Categorical funds relied upon by many institutes for programs are cut by 32 to 62%. Under the categorical funding, the most affected is the TTIP or the Telecommunications and Technology Infrastructure Program. The second largest affected program is the library data base program where the fund approved was $4 million. There is no real hope of these funds being reinstated for quite some time now.

Implications of the budge are quite complicated with a lot of unclear issues leading to confusion. We come across the sad truth that even with a sanctioned state budget, circumstances do change. This grim situation, with the huge magnitude of overall cuts in community colleges deeply affects library budges in both materials and personnel. With reduced collection, hours are sure to be reduced.
 
According to sources, this is one of the largest and deepest cuts in California Community Colleges history. Student access to essential services will be hugely limited by the budget especially now when there is a significant enhancement in enrolments from the newly unemployed, returning veterans, four year students who are redirected and the high school graduates.

Hope is the proverbial life saver as always. Various options are being explored here by the California Council of Chief Librarians and the supportive Chancellor’s office. There is a strong action plan geared towards identifying centralized basic databases purchase options as a long term solution to this problem.