Request for CSUCI Funds Reintroduced

State lawmakers Wednesday reintroduced a $10-million budget request for Ventura County’s fledgling public university, money needed to open the Camarillo campus on schedule in fall 2002.

At the urging of state Sen. Jack O’Connell (D-San Luis Obispo), the Senate’s budget subcommittee on education earmarked the money for Cal State Channel Islands.

If the Senate approves the request, it will be included in the Senate’s budget for fiscal year 2000-01 when it is submitted to Gov. Gray Davis for approval this summer, O’Connell said.

“This sends a positive signal for the further development of the Channel Islands campus,” said O’Connell, chairman of the education subcommittee. “It’s one more step in the direction to having a full-fledged, degree-granting university by fall 2002.”

The allocation is needed to hire faculty to draw up the academic programs necessary to launch the Channel Islands campus at the former Camarillo State Hospital.

In unveiling his preliminary budget for fiscal year 2000-01, however, Davis rejected a similar funding request earlier this year.

The governor said he wanted CSU officials to figure out what went wrong with efforts to establish a range of income-generating ventures aimed at offsetting operating costs for a branch campus of Cal State Stanislaus in Stockton.

Although the governor said he was fully committed to providing additional funding for Cal State Channel Islands, he told CSU leaders that the Stockton situation must be resolved before the money becomes available.

Confident that Cal State University officials will soon be able to eliminate those concerns, O’Connell said he decided to resubmit the budget request.

Assemblywoman Hannah-Beth Jackson (D-Santa Barbara) has said she plans to make a similar request of her colleagues in the lower house.