YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – State funding for Eastern Gateway Community College will run out June 30, but expenses will continue.

That includes legal fees, audit fees and payments to security and information technology personnel, Fred Ransier, executive director, told members of the Eastern Gateway Governance Authority at a meeting Wednesday.

Records have to be maintained because of ongoing audits and investigations and court preservation orders, as well as retention and destruction schedules outlined by state law.

The college owns buildings in downtown Youngstown and at its main campus in Steubenville. Ransier said appraisals of those buildings are expected within the next few weeks, but the college can’t sell them – or equipment therein – because of ongoing litigation.

That means personnel must provide security for those buildings.

“That means we have to have staff,” Ransier said, adding that they have to be paid.

Those are among the things that must be determined as the June 30 date approaches, he said. Ransier’s contract, as well as that of Treasurer Michael Abouserhal, will also expire June 30.

Gov. Mike DeWine appointed the five-member authority, led by Kimberly Murnieks, Ohio Office of Budget and Management director, to oversee the college’s closure. Governance authority members appointed Ransier. The college stopped enrolling students after summer 2024 amid financial and accreditation problems.

Murnieks asked Ransier to develop a list of action steps and recommendations for the items that must be addressed.

As part of the authority’s charge, they must provide quarterly reports to the governor, legislative leaders and the chancellor of the Ohio Department of Higher Education. 

Greg White, governance authority member, said he doesn’t envision the closure process being complete by June 30. “And I don’t see how we get along without Mike [Abouserhal] and Fred [Ransier],” he added.

White suggested a warning be included in the first quarter 2025 report, advising that the governance authority will likely need more state funding to complete the closure process. It may need funding after the closure is complete as well.

“I think we concur, and that’s why we’re asking him to put together an action list,” Murnieks said.

Eastern Gateway saw record enrollment of close to 40,000 students before its downfall last year. Both the rise and demise can be traced to its free college benefit program, which enabled union members across the country to attend classes and earn degrees at no cost to them. Most attended classes virtually.

But the U.S. Department of Education ordered the college to end the program, arguing it was charging Pell Grant recipients more than students who didn’t receive the grants.

Enrollment dropped. The federal education department also placed the college on Heightened Cash Monitoring 2, meaning the college had to use its own resources to credit student accounts and wait for federal student aid reimbursements from the federal department.

The Higher Learning Commission, an accrediting body, placed Eastern Gateway on probation in 2021. HLC extended probation in November 2023, citing expected financial sanctions from USDOE, the college’s 2023 budget – which it called unrealistic – ongoing litigation and declining enrollment among the reasons. The probation was extended again. 

Then-college trustees voted in March 2024 to begin dissolution of the college June 30, 2024.

Compounding Eastern Gateway’s problems, Student Resource Center, the company with which the college contracted for the free college program, is suing in federal court, citing breach of contract.