UC Will Resume Site Search for a San Joaquin Campus : Education: The move comes as the university’s funding outlook improves. Board also scales back an increase in student fees.

To the delight of activists seeking a campus in the state’s central region, the University of California on Friday resurrected its search for a site in the San Joaquin Valley amid rosier estimates of the system’s near-term financial future.

In another sign of an improved budget outlook, the UC Board of Regents also formally approved a one-third reduction in the $995 hike in annual tuition fees it had previously voted for students of the system’s nine campuses. Average fees for full-time undergraduates who are California residents will rise $630 beginning in the fall, bringing yearly fees to $3,674, excluding room, board and books.

“That’s great news. That’ll allow access to other students,” said Felipe Bolivar, legislative advocate for the UC Student Assn. “If they’d gone the full amount . . . it would have blocked a lot of people, because those 300 additional dollars could have meant the world to some people.”

The unanimous vote to resume the site selection process for a new Central California campus reversed a decision in May to abandon the effort for fear of severe budget cuts. But because the cuts were not as deep as predicted, and because of a possible increase in funds the following year, the university will go ahead with a $1.5-million environmental impact report for the three finalist sites in 1994-95.

Officials said the vote was also intended as a signal to state lawmakers, some of whom have raised the possibility of amending legislation to authorize the money immediately if the regents first formally revived their plans to select a location for a new campus.

The Legislature had earlier included funding for the environmental study in the budget it sent to Gov. Pete Wilson, who vetoed the item last month. But Wilson has since declared his support of the UC site search, saying he acted only after the regents had already decided to suspend the project.

“We are still not in a financial position to commit ourselves to a timetable for construction of a 10th campus,” UC President Jack W. Peltason said. “Nonetheless, in light of these new developments, it makes good sense to go ahead with the (environmental report) so we will be able to move forward in a timely fashion.”

Two of the sites under final consideration are near Fresno, the third near Merced. “At least now the last five years’ worth of work . . . is still of value,” said Robert Carpenter, head of a committee lobbying to bring the campus to Merced.

The decision to scale back the hike in student fees came three weeks after state legislators, in an 11th-hour move, allocated an additional $25 million to the cash-strapped system specifically to ease the rising financial burden on its 125,000 undergraduates. Another $25 million was allotted to scale back a one-time 5% employee pay cut to 3.5%, which the regents also approved Friday.

“We’ve been very concerned about the level of (student) fees, particularly the rate of increase,” UC Vice President William B. Baker said. Even with Friday’s reduction in increases, fees have jumped 125% over the past four years.

But, Baker added, the university has not yet seen any “hard evidence” that this year’s originally planned fee increase of $995 resulted in a smaller pool of applicants.