Nic President Lays Budget On The Line For Idaho Lawmakers

A third of North Idaho College’s budget is under attack, and the Idaho Legislature needs to decide what to do about it, NIC President Bob Bennett told a legislative committee Wednesday.

“You’re going to have to figure out a way to either stretch your dollars further, maybe tax people in a different way than they’ve been taxed before, or our local board is going to have to go to the students and say, ‘Pay more,”’ Bennett said.

Big tuition increases, he added, would turn away the students who need NIC the most those getting training for a career that will allow them to support themselves and their families.

A third of NIC’s budget comes from local property taxes paid in Kootenai County. Several proposals have surfaced this year to reduce, replace or eliminate local property tax levies for community colleges. Idaho’s other colleges and universities are fully state-funded. Only the two community colleges levy local taxes.

Bennett said Kootenai County residents are strong supporters of NIC, but the property tax is becoming increasingly unpopular.

“They say, ‘Wait a minute - should we have to pay this tax when the people with the other colleges and universities don’t have to?’

“They like our program,” Bennett said. “They’re saying: Should the state pick this up?”

The One Percent Initiative, which might go on next fall’s general election ballot, would eliminate property tax funding of both community colleges and school districts.

Sen. Gary Schroeder, R-Moscow, the committee’s chairman, said if local tax funding ends, local control might end, too. The two community colleges could end up as branches of Idaho’s universities, which also might mean savings on administrative costs.

Bennett responded, “Probably if they would look at only dollars, they might be able to do it cheaper. But they would lose the interest of serving the local community.”

And that’s what a community college is all about, Bennett said.

As a locally tax-supported district, NIC has a locally elected board that oversees the college.

Bennett said he favors continuing at least some local tax to support Idaho’s community colleges, but wanted the Legislature to be prepared if that money is threatened.

, DataTimes