On June 20, the Chancellor's Office released its long-awaited ruling based upon the Faculty Association's request from last December. The ruling is a mixed bag. The Chancellor upheld FA contentions that the District was misclassifying faculty reassigned time and interfund transfers for 1998-99. The District, for example, was claiming reassigned time as classroom instruction and thereby was reducing the amount of money required to be spent on classroom instruction. It should have been non-instructional. The District also incorrectly classified almost half a million dollars of interfund transfers, which also had the same effect of reducing the amount of money required to be spent on instruction.

In other areas of FA contention, including the classifying of parking, community services, replacement equipment, ancillary activities, capital outlay and leases, the Chancellor ruled that the District's practices were within the law. However, the FA has serious concerns about some of the questionable representations of evidence the District provided in these areas.

Therefore, when the Chancellor then refigured the District's calculation for 1998-99, he found the District still in compliance at 50.68%. However, the Chancellor refused to even rule on the years the FA had requested a ruling on (95-96, 96-97, 97-98), years in which the District had already reported a razor-thin compliance using incorrect classifications. The Chancellor also refused to rule on other issues such as lottery money. In the meantime, over the summer the state auditor looked at 50% rule compliance in twenty districts, and according to Chancellor Nussbaum, found a widespread lack of compliance. The final auditor's report is due on October 12.

The current situation is fluid and fast-changing. FA leaders have been meeting with administrators in an effort to resolve differences. The FA believes that the Chancellor's ruling gives it a strong case should the FA return to court to seek remedies for the original years of the lawsuit. In the meantime, the FA has requested that the District sign a tolling agreement regarding the original lawsuit, which means that the statute of limitations would be suspended so that both sides can stay out of court and work out a settlement. Such tolling agreements are usually routine. The FA regards such an agreement as a peace treaty and would send a message to the campus and community that both sides are willing to trust ahat a solution can be found. Time, however, is short.

Copies of the ruling are available to any member upon request.