There’s another way.

Our state’s two-year colleges (CTCs) are valuable to our community. They serve as engines bolstering the economy by providing the road to success for thousands of our citizens and others.

But as Green River College President Eileen Ely and Trustee Pete Lewis pointed out last week (“Show your support for higher ed”, guest opinion, Reporter), our colleges are underfunded, and the situation is getting worse.

We can no longer rely solely on tax dollars. With the state Legislature struggling to find ways to address the urgent funding mandates for K-12, funding for two-year colleges will fall even further behind.  It’s been seven long years since the faculty have received step increases for their continued education, hard work and dedication to teaching. We have worked diligently with legislators and college presidents to adequately fund our CTCs, but the system has yet to come up with a solution. There’s another way to help bring faculty salaries to fair and just levels besides just using tax dollars: allow the use of local dollars to supplement community college teacher salaries.

Just what are local dollars? In the language of state institutions, local dollars are funds to the college not provided by the state. These “local funds” come from sources like tuition, federal and private grants, (think Bill Gates Foundation) from entrepreneurial efforts such as training provided to businesses, and from recruiting and enrolling international and other out-of-state students.

Like some other Washington state colleges, our own Green River College has a thriving, revenue-generating international program that recruits thousands of students from outside the United States and enrolls them.

We provide our international students with the first two years of their college education and they in turn provide the college and community with a rich experience in diversity and global awareness.

Yet very little of this money is used to fund faculty salaries. Instead, it’s often used to fund special projects and new administrative positions and interests not supported by the state. In their article, Ely and Lewis correctly point out that without faculty and staff, the college could not function. And while it’s true that faculty and staff have not received earned salary increases since 2008, they fail to mention that not only has the number of administrative positions increased but many administrators have also received considerable salary increases, much of them funded through local dollars.

While some of the special projects funded by local funds are good for the college and the community, we must not ignore faculty salaries in the equation. Faculty and staff salaries have not kept up with the cost of living. Some CTCs elsewhere in our state have successfully worked with their teachers to use local funds to compensate faculty for additional work and responsibilities directly benefiting students. It’s time that Green River and the state Legislature follow suit.

Like Ely and Lewis, the faculty of Green River College urge you to tell your legislators to fully fund the very valuable community resource that our community and technical colleges are. Realizing that the government probably isn’t going to fully fund faculty salaries, tell your legislators and your college’s leadership to support the use of local dollars to help fund faculty compensation.

Additionally, tell them to support House Bill 1863, which would allow the use of local dollars to fairly and adequately supplement two-year college teacher salaries when tax dollars can’t.

Mark Millbauer has taught in the auto body collision repair program at Green River Community College for 21 years. He serves as president of the Green River United Faculty Coalition.