Change in Budget Will Allow New Clinical Science Building at UCSD

Regents for the University of California made a change in their budget Friday that will allow the UC San Diego School of Medicine to build a new $25-million Clinical Science Building.

“The Clinical Science Building will add 60,000 square feet of desperately needed research space to the medical school campus,” said Dr. Ruth Covell, the school’s associate dean for planning.

To accommodate growth in recent years, the school has had to lease office space and build temporary modular buildings on the La Jolla campus, Covell said. But without the additional research space, expansion of medical programs and recruitment and retention of faculty could be “severely hampered,” she said.

The regents also approved the appointment of the firm of Arthur Erickson Architects, which specializes in institutional and commercial construction, to design the building.

The project, which is expected to cost $25.1 million, will be funded through private donations to the university, the university chancellor’s and president’s discretionary funds and other sources, Covell said.

The building will house programs for the the school’s Institute for Research on Aging, as well as provide space for research projects in AIDS, immunology and musculo-skeletal disorders.

Ground breaking is tentatively scheduled for November, 1989, with occupancy expected in July, 1991, Covell said.

The multistory structure will take up more than 100,000 gross square feet, including 60,000 square feet of laboratory and office space, Covell said.

It will be located east of the current medical teaching facility on campus.