Ad Hoc or Master Plan - Thanks, but no thanks

Assemblymember Dorothy M. Donahoe
who pushed the 1960 Master Plan through the 
Legislature (Donahoe Act)
 but died before it was signed.

We have been noting the erosion of the old Master Plan and the substitution of ad hoc legislative enactments, essentially at the behest of the community colleges. It seems the community colleges got the bills they wanted through the legislature and now that they are sitting on the governor's desk, they don't like what they got. From CalMatters:

California’s community colleges have been trying for several years to offer more bachelor’s degrees. This year, they put their hopes in two sweeping bills designed to help them do that. But lawmakers made massive, last-minute changes that prompted the state’s community colleges to now oppose the legislation. The abrupt change of heart, spurred by new limits on how much the colleges could grow their bachelor’s programs, didn’t influence the outcomes of the bills, Senate Bill 960 by Sen. Christopher Cabaldon, a Democrat from Napa, and Assembly Bill 2694 by David Alvarez, also a Democrat from Chula Vista. Both passed...

Colleges would be able to offer an additional two to 12 bachelor’s degrees starting in 2028 depending on their students’ certificate, degree and transfer completion rates. No college district could propose more than three new degrees per year and districts would need to prove that there’s a workforce need in their region to justify the creation of a bachelor’s degree. That’s a claim the state’s labor secretary would step in to validate if the California State University system objects, as has regularly occurred in the pitched policy disputes between the community colleges and the university...

“We’re being asked to … support a process that is not completely understood or vetted at the last minute, and so that’s just not great policymaking,” said Larry Galizio, president and CEO of the Community College League of California, an association representing community college presidents and board leaders...

Full story at https://calmatters.org/education/higher-education/2026/09/community-college-bachelors-degrees-california/.