EL DORADO — Though the El Dorado Conference Center hasn’t been in the black since it’s opening, South Arkansas Community College administrators see light at the end of the tunnel.
With the exception of half of the manager’s salary and benefits, the El Dorado Conference Center’s final year-to-date excess revenue totals to a negative $263,289.
“We lost less money than we did last year, which is a good thing when it comes to the conference center. In fact, you’ll notice that last year we went over that $300,000 threshold and we didn’t this year,” finance vice-president Carey Tucker said.
This year is already giving the event space a better financial footing than last year, Tucker said. Conference center director Barry Bagwell said that he attributes a strong fourth quarter to Murphy USA and Lion Oil that booked company training sessions there.
“We’ll probably have more wedding receptions in 2017 that possibly we’ve had since we’ve been open … We continue to look for ways to lower expenditures,” Bagwell said. “The goal is to minimize the college’s contribution to the break even point.”
The center’s bookings through the month of April, its revenue is higher than 2016, the El Dorado Conference Center director said. When asked about the Murphy Arts District’s effect on conference center bookings, he said he didn't have the answers.
The district is El Dorado Festivals and Events’ ongoing project that includes a farm-to-table restaurant, amphitheater and
music hall.
“In the long run, we hope to bring more people to El Dorado so it should benefit all of us,” SouthArk President Barbara Jones, Ph.D.
As of Jan. 31, the college’s excess year-to-date unrestricted revenues over expenditures are a little over $2 million, Tucker said.
“Just to correlate that with what we had going on last year during this time, we were sitting at $1.6 million so that’s a more positive flow … The primary reason is we’re about $600,000 down in expenditures so that’s the driving force,” Tucker said. “Our budget is pretty close to being dead on this year.”
Jones and Chief Effectiveness Officer Dr. Stephanie Tully-Dartez gave a presentation on the Higher Education Productivity Funding Model that emphasizes accountability and student success instead of enrollment and faculty demographics.
In a statement Governor Asa Hutchinson said, “The purpose of this additional funding is to incentivize efficiency and outcomes for our institutions of higher learning and I appreciate the support this proposal has received from college and university presidents across the state.”
According to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, the Senate Education Committee approved House Bill 1209 without dissent and the House passed the bill 80-10 on Jan. 31. The model would be enacted at public colleges in the 2019 fiscal year, if the Legislature adopts the new formula measure.
The model, developed from a master plan developed by Arkansas Department of Higher Education, is “still in the works” and would affect about two percent of the college’s yearly budget, Dr. Jones said.
“We’re still trying to figure it out … You’ve heard about the governor saying that they had 10 million new dollars for higher education and that’s they money they’re going to put into this productivity model,” the president said. “It’s going to focus on primarily on what they call effectiveness that (accounts for) 80 percent and affordability that’s 20 percent … That’s going to focus on time to degree.”
The amount funding is determined on a weighted score that assesses things like degree and transfer completion, students’ credentials after graduation, proficiency in core subjects and how long it takes for students to obtain a degree or technical certificate, Tully-Dartez said.