COLLEGE BUDGET HITS $27.1 MILLION.

Byline: Mary Schubert Daily News Staff Writer

Reflecting College of the Canyons' enrollment growth over the past year, the district's board of trustees this month approved a $27.1 million budget for the 1997-98 school year.

While budgets are subject to flux during the course of a year, the current spending plan nonetheless is $5 million higher than the 1996-97 College of the Canyons budget. State law requires community colleges to adopt a budget by Sept. 15, said Gary Olmstead, dean of business services.

Last year, the college operated on $22,052,970. The current budget - totaling $27,154,380 - will carry the campus through June 30. But that sum could change between now and then, as is common in the budgets for schools, cities and other governmental bodies.

More than half of the 1997-98 budget - $16.5 million - goes to pay salaries and benefits of the college's 430 full- and part-time employees. Last year, College of the Canyons had 365 employees and spent $13.7 million on salaries and benefits.

The campus is among the 10 biggest employers in the Santa Clarita Valley. This fall, enrollment reached an all-time high of 7,000 students, said college spokesman John McElwain.

``This year, we're the fastest-growing community college'' in California, Olmstead said. ``We're trying to grow 18.5 percent. The average growth factor at community colleges is 1.2 percent,'' he said. ``As a consequence, we need more people - more instructors and more programs.''

In the section of the budget devoted to the college's building fund, the trustees approved a spending plan in which $8 million was set aside for construction and renovation projects. That sum is $33,516 less than last year's total.

The biggest chunk of the college's 1997-98 building fund is $4.6 million to renovate the old library - in a section of the I Building on campus - into classroom space, Olmstead said. A new, $8.2 million campus library, built in its place, opened several months ago.

Construction to transform the old library into classrooms may get started in January, and will take about a year to complete, Olmstead said.

Another $1.8 million from the building fund will be used for deferred maintenance, Olmstead said. That project includes updating the college's electrical wiring and lighting, and installing fiber-optic cables and other electronic switching equipment that can link the various buildings on campus, he said.

Also in this year's budget, the college set aside $125,000 toward the new student center on campus.