When the original grand plan to build the hotel/conference
center had to be halted in spring 2011, the administration apparently concluded
that the problem was not the scale of the project but the process by which
it was unveiled. That is, it was
concluded that the plan had leaked out too soon, sparking opposition. In this view, if only the plan could be
withheld from public scrutiny the next time around, all would be well. Sadly, the Senate largely went along rather
than insisting that the secret process was not going to be acceptable. As a result, there was officially no plan
until Feb. 9. The Committee on Planning
and Budget did not get the plan until March 5 or 6 when the Regents did, but
unfortunately this delayed sequence occurred with Senate concurrence. Why was it allowed?
In reality, the administration desperately needed Senate
blessings and the Senate could have done the administration a favor by
insisting, shortly after the press release came out last fall announcing the revised
plan in “concept,” that it wanted a business plan pronto. The fact that there is little difference
between the fall press-release plan and the final February 9 plan that went to the
Regents in March indicates that the administration was committed to a
slightly-scaled-down version of the original hotel but at a less offensive
location. It was committed to the idea that if it dropped replacing the Faculty
Center and kept control of the process, the Regents would rubber stamp the
revision. The now-revealed business plan is nothing that could not have been
produced a short time after the fall press release.
Had the Senate insisted on a plan pronto and on obtaining
the external critiques (with whatever biases were entailed), it would have
ended up asking the same questions of the administration that the Regents
asked. And had those questions been
asked well before the Regents meeting, at least there might have been better
answers from UCLA at the Regents rather than the embarrassment and loss of
credibility that occurred. There is no
guarantee, of course, that the questioning might have led the administration to
a fundamental rethink. The
administration might have stuck with its diagnosis that the problem was just
one of controlling the process to keep information from getting out.
It’s still not too late for the administration to rethink
and certainly it’s not too late for the Senate.
Maybe, just maybe, the true goal of facilitating academic conferences
needs to be the focus rather than process.
If you start with the true goal, as previous posts on this blog have
noted, you don’t necessarily end with a grand monument. Ultimately,
the Regents will approve the project as currently proposed if UCLA’s chancellor
insists on it. Undoubtedly, “answers”
to the Regents’ questions can be produced by the next Regents meeting. But pushing the project through that way
leaves a troubling impression that will linger about how UCLA and its leadership set priorities
for scarce resources.
Too many people have painted themselves into a corner on
this project. But when you paint
yourself into a corner, the only thing holding you back from walking out is –
after all - just paint.
The CPB report is below:
Can we hope something better can be produced in light of the
morning after?
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