Groups Protest UCI Land Sale for Tollway

Groups of students at UC Irvine mocked the actions of university officials and “mourned the death of public education” at two separate protests Wednesday.

One group staged a play entitled “The Heinous Land Sale Power Lunch” to criticize UCI Acting Chancellor L. Dennis Smith and other officials for selling 25.2 acres of campus land for the construction of the San Joaquin Hills tollway.

The university approved the sale in December for a tollway project that would extend the Corona del Mar Freeway from MacArthur Boulevard in Newport Beach to Interstate 5 near San Juan Capistrano. A small portion of that $1-billion, 17.5-mile tollway would cross the southern part of the campus.

More than 100 people waved signs and shouted protests in front of the administration building, and then marched into the chancellor’s office to deliver a letter demanding the reversal of the sale.

Smith was away from the office but his assistant, Leslie Millerd, accepted the letter.

Smith, who could not be reached for comment Wednesday, has said that the sale “is integral to the continued growth and development of the UCI campus,” and the highway would relieve about 35% of UCI traffic. He has also asked that some of the sale money be used to lessen any environmental damage.

But opponents contend that the highway will endanger the wildlife habitat of the California gnatcatcher, a small gray songbird, and jeopardize the UCI Ecology Reserve, a natural laboratory used for study by graduate students.

Brad Berger, a member of Student Activists For the Environment, which organized the protest, said many students were outraged by the administration’s “behind-the-back” decision.

Berger said the Dec. 10 University of California Board of Regents meeting, where the decision to sell the land was made, was not well publicized and was held during a time when most students are occupied with finals.

But Karen Newell Young, UCI director of public information, said the meeting was open to all students, staff and faculty members.

“There have been lots of opportunities for people to present their viewpoints,” she said. “The issue was discussed at great length.”

A few miles from the campus, another group of students held a vigil to protest the closed meeting Wednesday of the UC Council of Chancellors, an advisory council.

Clad mostly in black, the small group quietly held signs with tombstones marked in the name of public education. They charged that closed meetings would harm public education.