Candidates for Pima Community College’s only contested board seat fielded questions this week about transparency, tuition rates and textbook costs.
A standing-room-only crowd turned out for a student-run forum for candidates seeking the District 5 seat on PCC’s Governing Board.
Martha Durkin, retired deputy manager for the city of Tucson and former attorney for the city’s largest school district, is making her first run for public office after filling the board seat on a temporary basis, and she’s being backed by the rest of the board.
Luis A. Gonzales, a former state senator who spent eight years on the Legislature’s education committee, is being backed by a citizens’ group whose past complaints about problems led to accreditation sanctions against PCC.
A third candidate, former PCC instructor Francis Saitta, is on the ballot but chose not to participate in the forum.
Durkin, a supporter of the college’s current administration, cited her passion for PCC and said the decades she spent as a public employee gave her the skills needed to oversee the school.
Gonzales called the college “the single most important educational institution in Southern Arizona,” and said his years in public life taught him how to figure out “where the skeletons are buried.”
The hour-long forum, held Thursday at El Rio Learning Center on West Speedway, centered mainly on written questions submitted by students and members of the audience.
On the question of transparency — whether PCC complies with laws and practices that protect the public’s right to know — Gonzales said lack of disclosure “is one of the biggest problems” facing the school. Durkin agreed there are weaknesses but said improvements she pushed for are already underway.
Asked about the PCC board’s decision this year to raise tuition for local students while reducing it for international students, Durkin defended the change as one that would help the college financially and said even with the changes, PCC still is in the bottom third statewide for in-state cost of attendance among community colleges.
Gonzales criticized the tuition plan, saying he wouldn’t have voted for it. PCC should not be raising local tuition while giving discounts to “wealthy students from China and the Middle East,” he said to a smattering of applause.
Candidates also were asked what they would do to protect PCC students from a common snafu, in which they register and buy a nonreturnable textbook for a course the college ends up canceling.
Gonzales said the college needs to negotiate a better return policy with its bookstore, and said students should be warned not to purchase textbooks in advance. Durkin said she favors expanding the use of free online textbooks.
The forum, attended by an estimated crowd of 100, covered a range of other topics from employee rights to federal student aid regulations. It was run by PCC’s Inter-Campus Council, in conjunction with the college’s Adult Basic Education civics and student leadership program.
