Deja View : An updated look at some of the people, places and programs featured in Valley View during the year : CAL STATE NORTHRIDGE : Step Is Taken Toward Saving Orange Grove

The ultimate fate of the last remaining orange grove at Cal State Northridge was very much in doubt last spring, after school officials proposed replacing the 50-year-old trees with a parking lot. But the university administration, perhaps in response to campus and community outcry, took a first step early this month toward preserving the grove.

“I am ecstatic,” said Rachel Polish, 19, a student government senator active in the fight to save the grove. “We’re losing green space on this campus constantly. We have to preserve what we have left.”

Earlier this year, CSUN planning officials warned of the expected demise of the nearly 500-tree grove to make room for one of the school’s several capital improvement projects, probably a parking lot next to a $49-million visual and performing arts center. Also, the trees were said to be slowly dying off from age, disease and a lack of public funds for maintenance.

Faculty members and students, among them Polish and campus Green Party club founder Fabio Escobar, soon launched a campaign to save the three-acre grove, enlisting the support of the Sierra Club and the San Fernando Valley Homeowners Assn.

“That gave us a well-rounded coalition,” Polish said. “The homeowners have been against expanding the university for quite some time. They want to preserve as much green space as they can.”

Ultimately, the Campus Master Planning Board voted to recommend saving the trees. But, cautioned CSUN spokeswoman Kaine Thompson, it now is merely a recommendation, which has been passed on to the University Planning Council. “It is not a done deal,” Thompson said.

The decision of the Planning Council is subject to approval by CSUN President James W. Cleary, who earlier expressed hesitation about sacrificing the orange grove and “a little bit of history of the Valley.” Cleary, who is retiring after the spring semester, had promised 20 years before to save the grove at the campus main entrance on Nordhoff Street after other tracts of trees were cut down for parking space.

“Only about 5% of the trees are dead, and with watering the rest could easily be revived,” Polish said. “Not only do they absorb noise pollution from the street, they also absorb a great deal of smog. If those trees were torn down you would definitely notice a change in the San Fernando Valley.”