Beware of the wild guesses of yours truly

We have been following the question of whether a lower court decision saying UC-Berkeley would have to cut back its planned enrollment. At one point in the blog postings, yours truly made a "wild guess" that somehow this verdict would not stand.* Well, at least I called that guess "wild." Read on:

Capitol Alert of Sacramento Bee

UC Berkeley must cut enrollment by thousands after California Supreme Court ruling

Andrew Sheeler, 3-3-22

The University of California, Berkeley, must cut enrollment by thousands of students, after the California Supreme Court on Thursday denied the university’s petition for a stay on a lower court’s order. Under that court’s order, UC Berkeley must limit its student enrollment to 2020-21 levels, meaning the university must rescind at least 5,100 admission offers to reduce enrollment by 3,050 students. The Supreme Court’s ruling represents a 4-2 decision, with Justices Goodwin Liu and Joshua Groban dissenting. 

In the dissent, Liu wrote, “In addition to the acute loss to each of these prospective students, the City of Berkeley would also be denied the social and economic benefits of accommodating a full student population, while the university’s potential loss of $57 million in tuition would undermine California’s interests in expanding access to education. “This is not even to mention the contributions of leadership, innovation, and service that our state and broader society may lose if thousands of students have to defer or forgo attending UC Berkeley this fall,” Liu wrote. 

At issue is a California Environmental Quality Act lawsuit filed by the community group “Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods,” which seeks to block a student housing project. The group argues that UC Berkeley should not be expanding enrollment when there is not enough housing for existing students. “UC Berkeley has known since last August that they were subject to an enrollment cap, yet they took no action to notify applicants that they would be required to admit fewer students for Fall 2022. Instead they waited until late January to notify students. This cynical political move uses our deserving young Californians as pawns in a political effort to avoid the severe impacts that unmitigated enrollment growth has had on low income tenants in the city of Berkeley,” said group President Phil Bokovoy in a statement after UC Berkeley sent out letters to thousands of prospective students warning them that their admission may be rescinded. 

“UC Berkeley has repeatedly rebuffed (Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods’) offers to reach a reasonable settlement as recently as early December concerning UC’s failure to house its additional students,” Bokovoy added. “In addition, UC Berkeley students themselves have repeatedly said that UC should stop increasing enrollment until it can provide housing for its students.” 

In a statement released following the California Supreme Court’s decision, UC Berkeley’s public affairs office expressed disappointment with the ruling, calling it “devastating news for the thousands of students who have worked so hard for and have earned a seat in our fall 2022 class.” The university said that it is in talks with lawmakers “to identify possible legislative solutions.” 

“At the same time, we are preparing to implement enrollment reduction in case there is no timely fix,” the university said in a statement. “Our implementation strategies will focus on mitigating the harm to prospective students, largely by increasing online enrollment and/or asking new, incoming students to delay enrollment until January 2023. While these strategies will enable UC Berkeley to make available as many enrollment seats as we can, the lower court order leaves us with options that are far from ideal.” 

The California Supreme Court’s decision also has drawn condemnation from the Bay Area business community. The Bay Area Council, a public policy advocacy organization representing Bay Area businesses, issued a statement calling the decision “a crushing blow” to the dreams of thousands of students. “We continue to work with UC Berkeley, city and state officials and legislators on a possible solution that will allow these students to enroll this fall,” Bay Area Council President and CEO Jim Wunderman said in the statement. “What this terrible lawsuit clearly and loudly demonstrates is the urgent need for comprehensive reforms to the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), which has become a primary tool of local activists and others in blocking housing and other vital infrastructure our state badly needs. It’s long past time to bring CEQA into the 21st century so that it better reflects today’s environmental, social and economic priorities.”

Source: https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article259021993.html

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*http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/02/too-many-at-berkeley-part-2-wild-guess.html.

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Editorial Note: The governor and the legislature could act to override this decision in some way. The push for increased enrollment is in fact a product of pressure by the governor and legislature. But yours truly will take a pass on making further wild guesses about what will happen. But for the political actors at this point, it's pretty much "put up or shut up" on enrollment.