How times change. Seven years ago, University of California Regent Ward Connerly found willing allies when he sought support from his fellow regents for his initiative banning affirmative action in public education, employment and contracting.

Last week, when the regents considered his new Racial Privacy Initiative (RPI), which would bar state agencies from collecting data by race in most instances, Connerly found mostly passionate foes. While Connerly apparently sees his second initiative as a logical extension of the first, most of the regents see it, correctly, as a giant step too far.

RPI has qualified for the March 2004 ballot, though if a recall petition against Gov. Gray Davis qualifies and necessitates an earlier special election, RPI would go before voters along with it. The regents had no formal need to take a stand on the matter; some board members, in fact, argued that the university should stay silent on a potentially divisive political issue (never mind past practices).

But at the urging of UC President Richard Atkinson, who warned that RPI could "restrict the university's ability to conduct basic research [and] policy-related research," the board voted 15-3 to oppose the initiative. The vote holds no formal bearing on the initiative, but it is worth noting that Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson and state schools Superintendent Jack O'Connell, who are regents by virtue of their elective offices but seldom attend meetings, showed up to vote with the majority in opposing the initiative.

Indeed, early support for RPI appears softer than was early support for the affirmative action ban that became Proposition 209. That may be because the public recognizes the sharp differences between the proposals. One came in response to excessive use of race preferences that many people considered unfair. The second seems to spring from Connerly's strange notion that we can cleanse ourselves of racial strife and racism if we just quit keeping track of racial data. Oddly enough, enactment of RPI could prevent us from knowing for sure if the excesses targeted by Proposition 209 have been addressed.

The truth is, we still live in a world where racial data are needed to inform us about discrimination. Connerly has made some important exceptions for medical patients and research subjects, housing, law enforcement functions and federally mandated data collection. But the initiative is still too restrictive. Consider, for example, how it could undermine the state's public school accountability system, which seeks to close the achievement gap by shining light on ethnic differences in academic performance.

Most of us want a colorblind California. We just can't afford to be blind to reality.