Opportunity for UCSC, Santa Cruz negotiation?
Santa Cruz Sentinel 4/24/07
The ballot measures were rejected on purely technical grounds. But the delay between this decision and the next election might turn out to be a positive thing.
The very existence of the ballot measures is evidence of a failure by the university and the city to negotiate with each other in good faith. Admittedly, city leaders like putting anti-growth measures on the ballot as a way to get the vote out, but both the city and the university would prefer not allowing disagreements to reach the ballot box and the courts.
That's why we agree with UCSC interim Chancellor George Blumenthal that this delay just might give both parties a chance to negotiate over the future of UCSC growth, the impact on the city and the costs involved for both agencies.
UC officials have announced that negotiations are going on over the matter of UC reimbursement for costs related to growth — particularly over water and traffic.
Blumenthal told the Sentinel last week: "We will be making a fair-share [monetary] offer and then hope to put these issues behind us"
Since taking over as interim chancellor last summer, Blumenthal has sounded confident that the university and the city could come to agreement about growth on campus and the impact on the community if they worked harder at negotiating.
We agree to an extent. But the goals of the city and of the university often differ. UC Santa Cruz considers that the public it serves is far beyond the city limits of Santa Cruz — and even Santa Cruz County. Each UC campus serves statewide demands for undergraduate education, as well as national and international scopes of research.
And, the university stands as an equal partner with the city as a governing agency. That means that the university doesn't need city approval for certain projects.
Many city residents, particularly those who live near the campus, would like growth to stop at UCSC, which now serves about 15,000 students. The university is looking at plans for about 19,200 students by 2020, although most people concede that no one knows for sure what the total will be.
Good-faith negotiations will be the best method of working out this problem. We sympathize with the impact of growth on the city — both financially and in increased impact on the environment. But we also realize that no university can stand still in terms of its development, and that an increasing state population dictates growth at UCSC as well as other campuses. It's naive to expect that nothing will change.
Santa Cruz receives great benefits from having a university here. The city also has to put up with a continuing influx of students, professors and support staff.
Coming up with a negotiated agreement makes more sense than continuing the expensive ballot measures and ensuing court battles. We hope that the city and the university will be able to come up with something between now and a future vote.