UC Berkeley must not be looking to consist of a jump in pupil enrollment within the supplemental environmental impact report (SEIR), it’s miles preparing for a brand new instructional and housing complex on Hearst Avenue, Mayor Jesse Arreguín contends.
The bounce to 44,735 college students on campus by 2022-23 differs substantially from the 2020 Long Range Development Plan (LRDP), the university signed off on in 2005, and to which the town of Berkeley agreed, Arreguín wrote in a letter that he sent to Cal. So UC Berkeley must put together a separate recruitment enrollment growth as a substitute for using the SEIR at the Upper Hearst plan as a means to replace its LRDP, he wrote.
“Increase in campus headcount by using eleven,285 college students and its influences were not studied within the 2020 LRDP and are, consequently, not ‘regular’ with the undertaking,” Arreguín wrote. The 2005 file said “the scholar population might grow by way of simplest 1,650 students among the 2001/02 academic year, after which stabilize at that range by 2010. Instead, the student population has accelerated by way of almost seven instances over that studied in 2020 (file).”
“As the campus has acquired pointers that it is the populace problem from the Upper Hearst Project EIR,” Dan Mogulof, a campus spokesman, wrote in an electronic mail, responding to questions from Berkeleyside. “However, CEQA requires that the campus examine the capability influences of a housing mission consisting of the Upper Hearst Project with present environmental conditions at the time the CEQA overview happens. Those environmental situations most honestly consist of the modern campus headcount. It is handiest by way of comparing the project with these baseline bodily conditions that the campus can decide whether an effect is great.”
The feedback by means of Arreguín has been submitted at some point of the general public entry method for the SEIR for the Upper Hearst Way challenge, which could add a new educational building for the Goldman School of Public Policy and a housing complex on Hearst Avenue and La Loma Avenue. The letter was added to additionally at the April 2 City Council agenda. The town of Berkeley is planning to post every other set of feedback, in step with Matthai Chakko, a city spokesman. The public comment duration closes on April 12.
Berkeley sued Cal in 2005 over its projected increase
In 2005, UC Berkeley prepared an LRDP that projected the university’s growth until 2020. Officials decided that the university would construct 2.2 million square feet of new area in that time. The college also projected there could be 33,450 students on campus through 2020.
The city of Berkeley sued the college over its LRDP in 2005, arguing that the plan did not sufficiently have a look at the effects of its building expansion on the metropolis. The two sides settled after UC Berkeley agreed to triple the amount it paid for town offerings, including fireplace safety and sewer use, from $500,000 a year to $1.2 million a year, adjusted 3% yearly for inflation. In 2018/2019, the college paid Berkeley $1,770,698, consistent with Mogulof. That covered $285,000 in payments from the Chancellor’s Fund.
