Butte County's two resident legislators say they recognize the importance of higher education to the local economy, but they see no honest way to fight for the local dollars while the state is awash in red ink.

Assembly members Rick Keene, R-Chico, and Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale, said they have both been in contact with officials at Chico State University and Butte College, and on both campuses there is fear of impending cuts.

"The nature of the beast is you have to prepare for the worst-case scenario," said Keene.

"As for Chico State, I have had several conversations with them and their (community advisory) board," said LaMalfa. "I understand what the impacts are going to be for them. I know they have been trying pretty hard to find areas to trim and cut back."

Recognizing the institutions are trying to make cuts, and also that cuts in their budget can have an exponential impact on the community's economy, doesn't mean the two feel inclined to fight for special treatment for their districts.

"When you are talking about a problem of the magnitude that we have, a $14 billion hole, we are going to have to look at absolutely everything," said Keene in a telephone interview from his Sacramento office. "I am only one voice and to be honest with you, it is going to be painful for absolutely everybody."

Echoing essentially the same sentiments, LaMalfa said, "I can't say, Cut everybody else's but mine,' and look at myself in the mirror and be honest.

"Everybody, across the board, is going to have to shoulder some of this burden," continued LaMalfa, also in a telephone interview from his Capitol office.

"This Legislature, this system, has not been responsible in its previous budgeting. We are trying to overcome three years of smoke-and-mirrors budgeting," he explained.

However, while two GOP legislators say cuts will hit everybody, if there is one area they both think needs to be protected, it is the community colleges.

"It's important not to let the junior colleges be the ones that are the fall guy in the process, because I think they are the workhorse that has the most access for the most people," said LaMalfa.

He said the community colleges, too often, become the "whipping boy" of higher education when budget cuts are handed out.

The community colleges, like Butte, are the "most accessible" of the state's higher education segments, according to LaMalfa. The California State University system, which includes Chico State, and the University of California make up the other two arms of state-funded higher education.

"In the overall hierarchy of higher education, the community colleges are the entry department," said Keene.

LaMalfa said community colleges provide options for people to get career training or for the single mother to get work skills, and these need to be protected.

All three segments of higher education talk about the importance of "accessibility," meaning the ability to get into the school, pay the fees and other costs, and go on to graduation.

"Our higher education system needs to remain accessible for people, but how we define accessibility has to remain on the table," said LaMalfa. He said there are some programs related to accessibility that deserve to be questioned.

"Outreach," the effort to attract students, is one area the assemblyman says may not be reasonable.

"There are some more dubious areas, where some of the outreach looks a little silly," said LaMalfa.

"You may have outreach when you have a shortage of students," he explained, but right now there is no such shortage and much of the outreach is aimed at increasing diversity in the student population.

"I think that falls into political correctness," he continued.

Also talking about the funding for higher education, Keene said the CSU schools and the community colleges are much more dependent on the state for their total budgets than is the University of California system.

The UC, according to Keene, has "much more diverse" funding sources than the other two segments.

LaMalfa said any discussion of cuts to higher education funding needs to be "geared to where the rubber meets the road. I think everybody agrees the classroom ought to be at the top of the list."

If the money should be going into the classroom, LaMalfa said a controversial computer system in the CSU called the "CMS," which stands for "common management system," makes no sense.

"What offends me, when we are talking about increased costs, is this CMS. This computer system would cost close to two-thirds of a billion dollars," said LaMalfa.

"Why does government always end up getting the short end of the deal? Why do we have to buy things that don't work, and have to experiment with them? We should be as careful with tax dollars as we are with our own dollars, or even more," he continued.

CMS is a CSU-wide computer hardware and software system that theoretically will streamline information sharing between the campuses and the university headquarters in Long Beach.