Laney College is facing a budget crisis. Dr. Patricia Stanley, interim president of Laney College, sent out a memorandum on March 28 detailing an expenditure reduction plan. 
 In February, Laney began addressing the problem of an up to $1.7 million budget deficit. The budget allocation that Laney received from the Peralta College District did not cover the number of class sections that were offered at Laney. 
Normally any budget shortfall is made up from the savings the college makes from having vacant faculty positions or from using part-time rather than full-time instructors. Part-time instructors make less money than full-time instructors and receive fewer benefits. 
In the fall of 2015, Laney hired 17 new faculty members. Therefore, there is less money available from these savings. Stanley’s memo officially notified college administrators that the budget gap would be filled “with existing salary savings from permanent faculty, non-critical classified and administrative positions and unrestricted discretionary budgets. “
Stanley went on to announce a temporary hiring freeze through the end of the fiscal year on June 30. This hiring freeze only includes positions paid from certain funds. Discretionary budgets taken from those funds will also be frozen. The only exceptions to these freezes will be spending on graduation, emergency equipment repairs hindering college operations and emergency student services “because they might halt college operations.” 
Other expenditure restrictions will also be imposed. Stanley goes on to say, “Although we expect very few exceptions to these expenditure limitations, there will be cases where it is in the institution’s best interest to proceed with a commitment.”
Stanley claims to be trying to meet budgetary restrictions while doing as little harm to student service programs as possible. 
A college budget forum was held on April 6. Peralta College District’s Vice Chancellor of Finance Ronald Little discussed: the governors January budget proposal for 2016–2017, current and future budget realities and an update on the work of the Budget Allocation Model (BAM) task force.
Little explained that it was hard to depend on the budget figures put out by the governors office in January because the official budget doesn’t come out until May and then those numbers have to be debated and either approved or amended. He also reminded the audience that some revenue sources would be expiring. Whether or not others would replace these funding sources was unclear.
What was clear was that enrollment at Laney and across the whole Peralta College District is declining. Berkeley City College (BCC) is the only campus whose enrollment is not down. The decline in enrollment means approximately a $5 million loss in revenue for the district. How much money Laney gets from the Peralta District is determined by enrollment. Laney, according to a faculty source, has been without any outreach programs to local high schools since losing its last outreach specialist David Reed. That has begun to change as the college has started trying to raise enrollment. 
If enrollment does not improve, Laney will receive less money from the district and be able to offer fewer classes, which will reduce enrollment further.