Area Report for Board of Trustees

Core Theme 1: ACCESS, Reduce barriers and close equity gaps to access for all community members, and,

Core Theme 2: STUDENT LEARNING, Increase educational success, collaborate to improve

• On April 22, 2026, Public Safety coordinated with Des Moines Police Department and Kent Police Department on a firearm report directed at specific Highline College students. Following law enforcement recommendations, the College initiated a campus lockdown when Public Safety Officers sighted the suspect vehicle on campus. The lockdown lasted approximately 30 minutes while Kent Police Department and Des Moines Police Department responded and searched the parking lots. Law enforcement, however, was not able to locate the suspect vehicle. 
• The Emergency Response Team met on April 23rd to debrief the lockdown incident, including discussions of lessons learned and future communication improvements.
• Public Safety sent out a notice on April 28th, notifying the campus community of a “First Amendment Auditor” on campus. First Amendment auditors are activists who film in public spaces to test if officials, including school employees, respect the right to record. They often upload such encounters to social media. Public Safety officers monitored the auditor’s actions to help put the campus community at ease and to ensure he did not enter private spaces. After about two hours of filming, the auditor left the campus without any significant safety issues.  
• Facilities Department is working with Access Services and Nursing to make ADA upgrades to nursing labs and classrooms. New ADA compliant furniture has been ordered. The team has completed ADA inventory of two more classrooms. The next step is to place orders and begin implementation across campus. 
• The Facilities grounds team assisted the instruction department with the revitalization of the community garden.
• The third virtual session of the Follow the Supply Chain to Vietnam Study Abroad was held on May 13th. I co-presented the history of Vietnam with two Vietnamese international students. In addition to the history portion of the program, Mr. Michael Michalak, former U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam, also presented about his experience in Vietnam. 

Core Theme 3: COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS, Create a more inclusive working environment and a more valued, visible relationship with communities we serve, and,

Core Theme 4: CULTURE & CAPACITY, Promote a campus culture which fosters equity and inclusivity supporting employee growth and development, and institutional capacity and transformation

• Budgets and Grants services hosted a training session for all grant managers on May 7th. A Washington State auditor also assisted with the training session. 
• Public Safety is working with King County Metro to implement a new State budget proviso for providing affordable transit passes to community college students. Highline College has been selected as one of the institutions for this pilot program. Metro has requested information from the college to analyze the feasibility and scope of establishing the trial subsidy transit program at Highline College beginning Fall Quarter 2026. Additional information will be provided once the details are finalized and ready for publication.
• David Menke, Director of Public Safety continues to sit on the Des Moines Police Advisory Board and make recommendations on policies which may affect the campus community. The current topics are Keep Washington Working Act ensuring Des Moines Police Department policies don’t facilitate or assist in federal immigration enforcement, and House Bill 2015, allowing local governments to impose a sales tax for public safety initiatives to address Washington State’s low number of law enforcement officers per capita.  
• Facilities, with help from ITS, rolled out a new work order process on May 6th through the use of MegaMation work order platform. The platform will allow for all submitted requests to be reviewed, prioritized, and assigned much more efficiently by Facilities Department.
• The state of our campus infrastructure continues to be a concern. Several of our buildings are more than 50 years of age. The lack of capital funding (to maintain and to improve conditions) is putting tremendous strain on our operations. We are currently in the process of relocating approximately 24 faculty out of Building 18 due to mold issues. Building 18 is one of the buildings scheduled to be demolished as part of the future capital project for the new Welcome Center for Student Success. However, with major capital funding delays, the new building is unlikely to be funded until at least 2029. For the time being, most of B-18 faculty will be temporarily relocated to Building 0 (former childcare center).

FISCAL & BUDGET

• Our Finance team met with the State Auditors on May 12th for the financial statement audit entrance. Trustee Exstrom was also in attendance representing the Board.
• Executive Cabinet has been reviewing and evaluating budget requests for FY26-27. A list of prioritized requests was provided to Budget Advisory Council (BAC) in early May. On May 7th, Executive Cabinet met with BAC to discuss the prioritized requests in more detail. As part of the budget planning process, BAC will evaluate all requests forwarded by Executive Cabinet to provide their own feedback and recommendations to Dr. Jamilyn Penn, Interim President, by May 15th.
• The third quarter financial statement is being presented to the Board for review in the May meeting.

Report submitted by Vice President of Administrative Services, Michael Pham