Letter of Non-Intent

The Beverly Hills Courier published an interesting history of the Japanese Garden and its proposed sale by UCLA in its May 4 issue.  Links to just that article and to the paper as a whole are below.  It contains an interesting statement by former Dean Fred Eiserling on p. 10:

Using a letter written by Dean of Life Sciences Fred Eiserling in June 1993 to Vice Chancellor Alan Charles, UCLA partially based its argument to sell the gardens on Eiserling’s assertion that it did research purpose and would be better suited for another use within the University. In 1965, the University’s Alumni magazine stated “the gardens will be used for instruction, conferences, and activities of many UCLA departments and University-related groups, especially architecture, art, botany, and theater arts.”

According to Eiserling, who served as dean of Life Sciences from 1987 to 2004, the intent of his letter was not to pave the way for the university to sell the property. “I was never part of the planning operation,” he said. “I wanted to divest the Life Sciences of that garden... From our standpoint it had no educational value.”

The full newspaper (it doesn’t break out individual articles) is at:

http://www.bhcourier.com/downloads/050412Fissue.pdf (The garden article appears on pp. 1 and 10.)

Read just the article below:

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