‘Free Flow’ College Bill Passes Vote in Assembly

SACRAMENTO —  Rejecting arguments that its action could further strain already strapped Los Angeles community colleges, the Assembly on Thursday passed a bill that would allow students to attend junior colleges outside their home districts.

The so-called “free flow” bill, pushed by Santa Monica Community College and other suburban junior colleges that want to see their enrollments grow, was sent to the Senate on a bipartisan 48-20 vote.

Passage followed a long and sometimes bitter debate in which supporters talked of the rights of students to choose where they go to school and critics derided the measure as a prelude to disaster for colleges that have been plagued by declining enrollment.

Recalling his days as a radical student activist, Democratic Assemblyman Tom Hayden of Santa Monica, who authored the bill, declared, “I believe students have a right to a voice in the decisions that affect their lives.”

Decried Measure

But Assemblywoman Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), who usually is on the same side as Hayden, decried the measure as a selfish attempt to help a college in his district. “What this is about is raiding a district because enrollments have dropped,” Waters said.

About 1.2 million students attend community colleges operated by about 70 separately governed college districts. State officials estimate that 12% of those students already attend community colleges outside their home districts under agreements worked out between their governing boards.

The “free flow” bill was the first in a series of community college financing and reform measures that are expected to touch off heated debate in the weeks ahead. Approval of the Hayden bill was considered crucial to gaining needed Republican support for legislation that will extend community college financing beyond June 30.

An even more controversial bill that would extend the widely criticized $50-per-semester community college fee until 1992 is scheduled for a floor vote next week.

Most community colleges statewide allow students to transfer between districts under agreements worked out among themselves. But that has been much less the case in Southern California, where Los Angeles Community College District officials for several years fought declining enrollment and worried that allowing transfers would exacerbate the problem.

Seeking to shore up its enrollment, college officials drafted a very restrictive agreement that, in effect, forced Santa Monica College and others to pay a large penalty for enrolling students who live within the Los Angeles district boundaries.

Last fall, however, enrollment climbed 11% in Los Angeles community colleges, and an additional increase of 7% occurred this spring. As a result, college officials were stripped of their strongest argument for blocking the “free flow” concept.

Some of the pent-up frustration over the issue erupted during the Assembly floor debate when Hayden charged that “protectionism in the case of Los Angeles district (trustees) led to . . . a lack of accountability and an arrogance of power.”

“They elect a board, they run a deficit, they come to the Legislature for a bailout and then they misrepresent their fiscal position to the Legislature,” Hayden said. “That is what happens over and over again.”

But in an interview, Cedric Sampson, vice chancellor of the Los Angeles Community College District, defended the district’s practices, saying it had no choice but to keep students from transferring to other colleges.

“When you lose students, you lose funding and you have to cut back on programs and then you lose more students,” Sampson said.