Eye On Illinois: Community college bill’s committee stall reflects conflicting priorities

In a state where one political party doesn’t need the other to advance legislation, impediments to action often boil down to priorities.

When Gov. JB Pritzker wrapped up the policy portion of his annual budget speech in February, he again suggested allowing community colleges to offer four-year degrees, “a consumer driven, student-centered proposal that will help fill the needs of regional employers in high-need sectors and create a pathway to stable, quality jobs for more Illinoisans.”

When Rep. Katie Stuart, D-Edwardsville, spoke to reporters last week after refusing to call a vote on advancing House Bill 3717 out of the House Higher Education Committee, she cautioned lack of care about such a change “could collapse the existing programs in” if public four-year colleges, “collapse their student base and just make them not able to be operational.”

In other words, this isn’t a two-sided debate as much as different constituencies targeting distinct problems. For anyone whose primary concern is strengthening public universities, HB 3717 could do the exact opposite. However, if the goal is to reduce professional shortages, expanding what community colleges can offer is a no-brainer.

CapitolFax’s Rich Miller wrote Tuesday about political forces underneath this and other topics where gubernatorial ambition runs headlong into legislative predominance. Understanding those considerations is important, but on a simpler level, it can be frustrating to see a commonsense proposal stall (for now) seemingly because it doesn’t solve a problem it wasn’t created to address.

To be sure, public higher education in Illinois faces several challenges. Capitol News Illinois reported Monday on substantial delays in implementing $2.9 billion in capital projects approved more than five years ago. Western Illinois University is struggling with deficits and layoffs. The Southern Illinois University campus in Stuart’s hometown is facing its own financial concerns, but she said her concerns with the bill focused more on schools like Northeastern Illinois and Chicago State.

Throw all that (and more!) in the hopper with ongoing uncertainty surrounding the U.S. Department of Education and potential ripple effects on grant and student loan funding and these are indeed precarious times for anyone preparing to send a high school graduate to college, let alone the stress on those tasked with keeping such institutions sustainable.

All that said, we’re all supposed to be on the same team here. Not politically, even within a party, but as regards offering a full range of educational opportunities that meet student needs and serve workforce concerns. Nearly 200 community colleges in at least 24 states offer some form of advanced degrees, so this isn’t an unsolvable puzzle.

One bill won’t fix all higher ed problems. Take care to avoid making things worse, but not at the expense of useful progress.

• Scott T. Holland writes about state government issues for Shaw Local News Network. He can be reached at sholland@shawmedia.com.