Sonoma State agrees to provide 'comeback plan' to lawmakers amid sweeping cuts

ROHNERT PARK, Calif. (KGO) -- The first in a series of legislative hearings was held on the Sonoma State campus on Friday.

Lawmakers called this session to hear what the impact of major cuts to academic and athletic programs is having on students and staff, but they also came to demand answers and action from university officials.

"College athletics is a big deal in our lives, I mean it is our lives," Jacob Garsez, the Sonoma State head baseball coach said.

Gripped with the reality that he might soon be out of job, Garsez is hoping lawmakers getting involved, could reverse the university's choice to cut athletics altogether, on top of 23 academic programs.

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"If you want to, there's a way, there always is a way to find the money," he said. "I don't have the exact numbers, but I have ran an athletics department before at the college level and I know that there's a very doable way to come up with those funds."

Before the hearing, students, coaches, faculty and staff held a rally in the Seawolf Plaza.

"Hopefully we can change this, we've got an opportunity today to make a change," John Sullins, a Sonoma State philosophy professor said.

Sullins, who has spent more than two decades teaching here, worries the future of the university will remain in jeopardy if cuts move forward.

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"If we pull this department, that department out, athletics out, then what attracts new students?" he said. "I feel that we're in this death spiral like a mall that loses this store, that store, people stop coming."

One month after the cuts were announced, lawmakers visited campus on Friday for a legislative hearing.

"Sonoma State turned my life around, I'm going to start getting emotional, I'm a graduate, I met my wife here," State Sen. Mike McGuire (D) Santa Rosa said.

McGuire says he came to the hearing to hold the university accountable amid a looming $24 million budget deficit for the next school year.

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"We need to be able to see a comeback plan," McGuire said. "It's up to the university and it's up to the CSU system to develop that comeback plan. We are prepared to invest but what are we investing in? The only thing that has been advanced are cuts."

A comeback plan the senator wants to see within the next 30 to 60 days.

"Sonoma State is not corporate America, it's not Tesla, simply cutting your way out of this isn't going to be successful," McGuire said.

Sonoma State's president told the legislators during Friday's hearing that they would see a plan within the requested timeframe.