Superintendent-President Dr.  Lori Gaskin confirmed that City College will not be building student housing from Measure S funds at the Board of Trustees meeting Thursday, Sept. 25.

Measure S is a $288 million bond that would fund renovation and modernization projects for the City College campus that gives the aging campus new life. The bond will be used to renovate old buildings, bring them up to code and modernize the campus.

The money would come from local homeowners and cost an average of around $67 per year for each homeowner. It will come from the assessed value of the property, at a rate of about $17 per $100,000 of property value.

California is home to 112 community colleges and only 11 of them offer student housing. The 11 that do are rural parts of Northern California and the Central Valley.

Gaskin said the student capacity for these housing communities’ range from as small as 32 beds to 140 beds.

“I just want to clarify that it’s tantalizing to compare us to UCSB in that regard,” said Gaskin. “But we’re so different in terms of our structure.”

Gaskin told the members of the board the variation between the institutions and how they function in terms of student housing.

UCSB and all UC’s have resources available by use of the central office that takes out long-term loans and fronts the money needed to build the necessary space to for housing. UC student fees and dorm costs go towards paying back these loans.

City College answers to the state and Chancellors office, neither of which offers the resources needed to do so.

“The pathway of building dorms is not necessarily one I’d advocate,” asserted Lori Gaskin.