Open Letter #2 to UC Merced Chancellor Steve Kang
Badlands Journal editorial board replies to Chancellor Kang's October 5 Message to Faculty and Staff
The production and dissemination of ignorance should not be the function of a chancellor of the state’s public highest education institution, even if only to the faculty on his own campus. The root of the problem with this communication by UC Merced Chancellor Steve Kang lies in the UC claim that it unilaterally, with the highest environmental purposes in mind, has reconfigured the footprint of the campus, choosing prime farmland rather than sensitive ecological habitat for its new development plans. The local public anticipated this move as inevitable in early 2003. A paper trail of public documents a dozen years old clearly shows that UC did nothing – from the original choice of the site to the golf-course site and forward—that it was not forced to do by an environmentally engaged public and regulatory agencies.
UC Merced “planning” is occurring on a foundation of political corruption. This is a real estate boondoggle project, a publicly funded anchor tenant that induced a gigantic local speculative real estate bubble, which has popped. In addition to extreme political pressure on local, state and federal resource and land-use agencies, UC, in league with finance, insurance and real estate special interests, has been involved in attempts to gut the federal Endangered Species Act and the state Williamson Act for its own benefit. Lawyers representing UC Merced recently concluded a series of negotiations and the chancellor applauds them for their “creativity.” The Merced participants found UC Merced to be negotiating in such dubious faith that they had to withdraw.
The chancellor’s communication to UCM faculty is a preemptive bit of flak to cover over more news of the unraveling consequences of a corrupt land-use process and to divert attention from an appellate court CEQA hearing on the UC Community Plan later this month.
Evidence continues to mount that it is a misfortune and an insult to the San Joaquin Valley that its UC campus was founded as nothing but a boondoggle anchor tenant for a huge speculative real estate boom. Merced now leads the nation in foreclosure activity at the rate of 1 per 68 households. The national average is 1 per 544.
SUBJECT LINE: A Message from Chancellor Kang
October 5, 2007
Dear Faculty and Staff Members:
I am pleased to share with you updated information about the environmental permitting process that you may read or hear about in the press in the coming weeks. The information involves revisions we are making in Phase II development plans for our campus and university community to reduce impacts on wetlands, improve land-use efficiency and move more efficiently through the required federal permit application process.
Under Gov. Gray Davis, UC established the “red and green teams” in state and federal resources agencies. These teams were composed of department heads, agency staff, legislators, local government officials, and staff from ethically challenged environmental, conservation and agricultural groups. Their mandate was to “streamline” i.e. circumvent the environmental laws and regulations applicable to the campus site. Meanwhile, in Washington, UC lobbied to eliminate the critical habitat designation section in the Endangered Species Act.
These are very positive changes that will expedite the permitting process and allow us to move ahead with full-scale development with renewed momentum and confidence. A press release will be issued later this morning and posted on the campus homepage at www.ucmerced.edu .
At this point, the “positive changes” consist of a proposal to reduce the footprint and to do a joint EIR/EIS, as should have been done in the beginning in Long Range Development Plan and the University Community Plan. It is a concept proposal, nothing more.
BACKGROUND
In order to be able to plan for future development of the campus beyond the 105-acre current campus footprint, the university must obtain a Section 404 permit that is required by the U.S. Clean Water Act. The land set aside for these future developments, which the university has already acquired, includes some federally protected wetlands that cannot be developed without the permit. (The current campus development includes no protected lands.) The permitting agency is the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
The University of California has a history at many of its campuses of building out onto lands that have been protected, conserved and preserved.
UC Merced submitted a complete permit application to the Corps in February 2002. The Corps is required to review the application against applicable environmental law and to seek public comment on its possible impacts.
The Corps rejected UC Merced’s application because it was incomplete. It was submitted early in the year the campus was supposed to open. As the Corps said at the time, Phase I of UC Merced was built at UC’s “own risk.” The community and the state expect UC to conduct itself openly and honorably. Californians expect its world famous “research” university to have done its research and fulfilled its permits before building, not afterward.
In the five years since our application was filed, we’ve engaged in numerous productive meetings with the Corps and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the agencies that share jurisdiction over federally protected wetlands, as well as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the California Department of Fish and Game. We’ve learned a great deal about the unique qualities of the regions environment while demonstrating long-term benefits a major research university is already bringing to this underserved region. These changes are the result of a mutual desire to move forward with the project while limiting its impact to the best of our ability.
UC had years to learn about the unique qualities of the region’s environment. It did its own studies and consulted voluminous previous studies on the region’s flora and fauna. There was no lack of knowledge about the ecology of this region. For the chancellor to state otherwise is to disseminate ignorance. Because UC knew so much about the regional ecology, with the help of regional business interests and their political representatives, UC has made continual attempts to circumvent regulatory compliance.
UC Merced has constantly employed its academic authority to erase and rewrite the history of Merced depending on the legal and regulatory obstacles before it. Members of the public find this arrogant, ignorant and deceitful flak unacceptable.
The previous proposal for a 910-acre main campus, finalized and certified in the campus Long Range Development Plan (LRDP) by the UC Board of Regents in January 2002, was our best initial estimate of what would be needed to fulfill the long-term mission of the 10th University of California campus. It was not based on a detailed architectural plan but rather a set of assumptions related to building design, topography, aesthetics, traffic management and other factors.
This " set of assumptions" was challenged in superior and appellate courts, where politically motivated decisions were rendered on behalf of UC. These faulty assumptions will now be used to tier off a new EIR/EIS.
Now that we have several years of research, teaching and operational experience on site, we are confident we can meet our long-term objectives on a slightly smaller footprint. Therefore, a new strategy for obtaining the 404 permit will allow the process to move along with renewed vision and momentum.
This “new strategy” was made necessary by a number of factors – political rather than ecological: the replacement of a senior congressman, Gary Condit, by a freshman, Dennis Cardoza; the loss of the several attacks in Congress on provisions in the ESA that were tailor-made to assist UC Merced; revelations of corruption in federal resource agencies that strengthened their resolve to enforce the law; various public relations disasters that occurred on the campus since it opened; and the manifest truth that UC Merced induced a wild speculatively driven real estate boom in Merced, the collapse of which has given the region notoriety as the top city for foreclosure activity in the nation. The collapse of this UC-induced speculative real estate bubble, projected to worsen in the time ahead, leaves more than adequate empty housing stock for UC Merced faculty and staff, erasing any argument for a UC Community new town adjacent to the campus. For faculty and staff not interested in buying houses with falling values, rentals in the north San Joaquin Valley are plentiful at moderate rates. Merced is reported by RealFacts to have the lowest rental rates in California.
What changes are implicit in the revised plan?
The size and configuration of the campus will change somewhat without affecting the overall scope or mission of the university. Specifically, the northern, eastern and southern perimeters will be redrawn. In effect, the campus will shift slightly south, with about 230 acres added to the southern perimeter and 335 acres taken away from the northern and eastern perimeters. The existing 105-acre campus, which lies within both the former and the redesigned footprints, will not be affected. These changes will reduce the size of the main campus at build-out from 910 acres to about 810 acres, or approximately 10.98%. The adjacent university community will also change slightly in dimensions and configuration, increasing from 2,133 acres to 2,160 acres. Total land needs for both projects will decline from 3,043 acres to 2,970 acres, or about 2%. (Click here to view a map that outlines previous and revised proposed campus and community footprints.)
All UC planners are doing is trading important rangeland/endangered species habitat for prime agricultural land vital to the economic survival of Merced County.
Why are these changes being made?
The change in the campus and adjacent university community footprint will reduce the amount of environmentally sensitive wetlands affected by overall campus development from about 121 acres to 81 acres, or approximately 33 percent. When added to changes made in late 2000, when the campus was repositioned further south from its originally intended location, the impact on wetlands has been reduced by about 95%. These changes support the university’s dual objectives of building a world-class research university to serve the people of the Central Valley and state while respecting the environmental resources on or near the campus site and balancing and minimizing impacts on both farmland and natural resources.
UC Merced created a more acceptable footprint and moved its plans for later phases onto prime farmland rather than rangeland/wildlife habitat because it was forced to by environmental groups and resource agencies. The chancellor misspeaks, saying this was done in support of UC “objectives.” Members of the local public are tired of UC constantly changing its story to conceal the fragmented, mismanaged waste of public funds beneath the surface. A most glaring example is that there is no coordination of mitigation for UC Merced impacts, therefore UC cannot assure its conservation strategies. All one has to do is look at the UC Parkway, the impacts of which are being mitigated outside the range of the impacted species. The public has no confidence and no legal assurance that UC will not develop its preserved, reserved and conserved real estate or that this land will remain protected. More than 10,000 acres of deep-ripped seasonal pastureland in eastern Merced County compromises UC’s ability to mitigate for its impacts in the eco-region it is impacting. While UC Merced tries to isolate its project and the project impacts, in fact UC Merced has opened up the entire east side of the county to induced growth. Today’s agricultural conversion from pastureland to orchard is tomorrow’s subdivision.
Beyond the environmental benefits of a revised campus footprint, what other benefits does the change bring?
Planning the physical campus expansion beyond Phase I is essential for continuing the development of stellar academic and research programs. By knowing the likely shape and size of the campus, academic administrators and the faculty will be better informed as they engage in planning for the future. In addition, campus officials recently began discussions for revising the campus LRDP since the timing is opportune to do so. In consultation with academic administrators, campus planners may consider options including greater density, repositioning of structures and facilities, and other measures that will improve land-use efficiency.
Will this change affect the current first phase of development in any way?
No. The design of Phase I is finished and is not expected to change. Construction on Phase I, which can accommodate up to 5,000 students, will continue as scheduled. Next year we look forward to the beginning of construction on the new Social Sciences and Management Building at full-plan size. Also, the next Science and Engineering building is scheduled to open in fall 2012, with construction projected to begin in 2010. Nearer term construction includes a new parking lot opening this month, the expansion of the Yablokoff-Wallace Dining Commons this year and other parking areas by the end of the year.
As evidenced by several major planning initiatives embarked upon this year, the change in the environmental permitting plan is just one of numerous factors at play. To ensure the long-term success of UC Merced, I will rely on many campus community members to participate in the numerous interrelated planning aspects including the campuswide Strategic Academic Planning process, the planning of two proposed professional schools (management and medical) and the overall Long Range Development Plan of the campus. This is why most of us joined UC Merced in its formative years --- to plan and build a world-class research university from the ground up. It’s an opportunity of a lifetime.
UC did not plan to pay for its infrastructure needs. UC sited the campus on one of the nation’s most valuable ecological areas. UC Merced did not do an EIR/EIS in the beginning of its planning process. UC did not plan for its water supply and induced leapfrog development by hooking into the Merced City water system. Everything UC Merced has done has been reaction rather than planning, illustrating the original point: it was a real estate boondoggle. One of the best examples of UC reaction has been its indemnification of local land-use authorities for legal costs arising from lawsuits filed by members of the Merced public against ill-planned phases of the campus development. This indemnification is the payment of state public funds to local public agencies promoting a speculative residential and commercial real estate boom anchored by UC Merced.
I would like to acknowledge Janet Young, Brad Samuelson, Tom Lollini, John Garamendi, Larry Salinas, Patti Istas, UC Counsel Anthony Garvin, and outside counsel Clark Morrison and Alicia Guerra for their creativity and diligence in devising a new plan for Phase II development that will fully meet our objectives while reaffirming our sensitivity to environmental protection and good citizenship. I also want to thank former Acting Chancellor Rod Park for his significant efforts toward this objective.
Steve Kang
Chancellor
The Badlands Journal editorial board suggests that UC Merced faculty and staff research for themselves the extensive public documents on this project, beginning with the 1995 EIR, which stated among other fictions that there was water in them there hills and the land was free. Your administration should be happy to make these documents available to you. If not, recall that UC is a public agency and it has to have the documents and make them available to you.