Trenholm State starts cutting personnel | News

MONTGOMERY, AL (WSFA)- Trenholm State Technical College President Sam Munnerlyn says the college has cut everywhere possible and now it's to the point 13 people will soon be let go.

"Our backs are against the wall, and we must do something for our own survival," Munnerlyn said, adding that "what lead up to this is over the last three years, the college has experienced a 33% decrease in funding." 

The president says starting in October the college will run on an $8.7 million budget.

"This is not something that we came up with in the last 5 minutes. We've been working on this at least three months now because we felt and knew this would happen eventually," Munnerlyn explained

The decrease is forcing the closure of Harper's Cooking Lab restaurant located on the second floor of a building on Commerce Street in downtown Montgomery.

"This does not just affect the culinary program, this is a college-wide initiative. We are moving forward with a reduction in force," Munnerlyn admitted.

The president says Harper's Cooking Lab is not closing, but the restaurant portion is shutdown, so the public will no longer be able to dine in on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Munnerlyn says it will result in a $600,000 yearly savings.

Measures had already be taken to avoid a reduction in force including:

• Reducing non-essential travel, activities, equipment, supplies & college memberships
• Enforcing a hiring and spending freeze by eliminating non-tenured full-time and part time staff positions including a reduction of adjunct professors by 20 percent.
• Streamlining purchases using lower cost vendors for daily operations
• Utilizing state inmate labor for maintenance and grounds work. 

"That does not yield enough money to make a difference, so eventually it starts to eat into personnel," Munnerlyn said. 

While Trenholm's president is not at liberty to disclose who those individuals are or what departments they're in, he has identified those who will no longer have a job at Trenholm State.

The president says the Alabama State Board of Education will approve the college's reduction in force plan Thursday, August 23^rd. He says those positions will be eliminated immediately.

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