Anonymous
By Joan Hartmann, Santa Barbara County’s 3rd District Supervisor & Gina Fischer, Chief of Staff to the 3rd District
UCSB has failed to respond with sufficient urgency to the dire crisis that it worsened by not keeping its commitment to build the 5,000 on-campus student housing units and 1,800 units for faculty and staff. UCSB’s failure has contributed to the high cost and scarcity of housing throughout our community.
Our entire community is suffering unprecedented housing shortages and exorbitant housing costs that constrain the ability of nearly every South Coast business, non-profit, and government agency to attract and keep employees. We are also seeing long-term residents being forced to leave and the balance between jobs and housing severely compromised, eating away at the integrity of our communities. A recent analysis by a UCSB doctoral student concluded that housing costs in counties with UC campuses are 1.5 times more expensive than the average US county.
Last month we visited a new 300-unit in-fill apartment community in Goleta. With a 98 percent occupancy, more than half of the apartments are being rented to UCSB undergraduates. Students of means are outcompeting our teachers, nurses, and hospitality workers for housing.
Our County and cities are laboring under rigid state mandates to boost housing production. The County must build 4,142 units in the unincorporated south coast by 2031 and the City of Goleta must build 1,837 more units. The allocation is six times greater than in the state’s previous housing cycle because of a formula that, along with projected population growth, takes our astronomic housing costs and crowding into account. UCSB bears a huge part of the responsibility for this situation.
UCSB’s housing failures have had terrible impacts on its students and faculty. Students have been forced to pay inflated rents, subsist in crowded and often dangerous conditions, and live in cars. Over 2,000 students are forced to triple up in dorm rooms designed for two. Many teaching assistants at UCSB spend well over half their salaries on housing. Faculty and staff are similarly affected. Others undergo long commutes from points north and south with more affordable housing.
UCSB is under a binding contract with the County and the City of Goleta for a build-as-you-grow housing as its student enrollment grew to 25,000 which occurred in 2021. In exchange for its commitment to build that housing, the County and City of Goleta formally endorsed the California Coastal Commission’s approval of the University’s expansion in 2010.
It is distressing that to this day, UCSB has failed to keep its legal and binding agreements while the campus received the benefit of its bargain. The campus recently and very quietly released a request-for-qualifications (RFQ) to build 3,500 student beds by 2029. This suggests that it could complete its housing 8 long years after exceeding enrollment of 25,000. Apparently the RFQ marks the end of UCSB’s pursuit of the controversial windowless Munger Hall and, instead, is pivoting back to building according to the 2010 plan, which effectively wasted a decade with no progress on housing.
However, the UC Regents’ Capital Financial Plan 2022-2028 reveals that UCSB has no realistic budget for the student, faculty and staff housing needed to accommodate its past growth, much less to address the future growth that the Regents are poised to accelerate. In its project objectives to the Regents, UCSB requested absolutely nothing for housing while six other UC campuses collectively asked the Regents for $4.79 billion for their housing needs.
Not all UC’s are housing scofflaws. UCLA has achieved its goal of guaranteed housing for all first-year students for four years and all new transfer students for two years.UC San Diego, while currently out of housing compliance, has a major project under construction to be completed in the next year.
Given the magnitude of the housing crisis and the university’s inability to address it, California’s Attorney General Rob Bonta could place UCSB under a consent decree for housing. Such a decree—the first of its kind—would ensure that the university is legally bound to take measurable and timely steps to alleviate its housing crisis. Governor Newsom and Attorney General Bonta are not bashful in publicly shaming or using the courts to bring cities and counties into compliance on housing, so why not hold our state institutions accountable as well?
Our community’s housing crisis requires concerted action. UCSB must demonstrate its commitment to its students, faculty, staff and its surrounding community by allocating significant resources to adding the on-campus housing to which it committed and is vital to its own existence. If they cannot, the state should intervene.
Op-Ed’s are written by community members, not representatives of edhat. The views and opinions expressed in Op-Ed articles are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of edhat. [Do you have an opinion on something local? Share it with us at info@edhat.com.]
Good points. The UC system has not been responsive to the needs of the students they purport to serve nor to the community that funds them. They have sold out to the “for profit” model and ignored their duty to the public. The UC system has allowed private corporations to coop patents and other income revenues that would fund the universities and colleges and allow them to continue the promised tuition free education to California youth. We need to hold the regents accountable as well as the politicians that have agreed to their compromises.
Great points here…The Mungers Jail design masquerading as a dormitory was a joke.
I this a surprise…? The State UC’s get “Carte Blanche” from everything the rest of Industry, Haz Mat, building codes, hiring procedures and other worker related processes that the “Masses” have to deal with once the State comes up with MORE regulations and ordinances…but hey, they ARE a Woke organization!
How much of this is due to Chancellor Yang’s lousy leadership, and when will he be replaced?
Goleta and the County sued UCSB many, many months ago over their failure to comply with the LRDP.
No reportable action.
You guys will reap what you sow when you voted for King Gavin.
Yep, that’s why we voted Democrat. As Democrats, we like things that Democrats stand for and do. It’s how that whole politics thing works.
Basic, who is “you guys”? Why is everything in your world “red team v. blue team”?
So simple minded.
I’m not a Democrat or a Republican. I have however enthusiastically embraced some of the more recent Republican values, like trolling and not giving a fuck about your feelings. Thanks Repubs for liberating me!
Good op ed – well laid out. Is it possible to not allow another student to be added to UCSB’s roster until the housing is in place. And since there is not enough housing in place now, to require UCSB to actually reduce the amount of students who could attend next year? It’s only fair that the housing should be in place before the students come.
Agree with above points. How is it that UCSB AND SBCC can be overlooked by governor Newsom (did I spell it right? Lol) at the expense of the general public in worsening the housing issues? I think the answer is clear – it’s dollars. Thanks Gov. and UC Regents, you’re real pals. More and more international and out of state kids coming in for more money per kid, and their parents are happily paying it, as well as their car payments for a new BMW or whatever that’s just ridiculous for an 18 year old that hasn’t even come close to making their way in the world yet. All the while screwing our local workers and students for housing. SB and Goleta have completely lost control over their housing. Hey, Newsom – who made you King?
I think you answered your own question Sac, right….lol
No, I didn’t answer my question. So again, why did you troll me here?
Alex, that’s pretty stupid. You know I didn’t vote for him. I bet you and Sac did though.
BASIC – why are you dragging me into this? Of course I voted for a democrat. Surprise….. I am a democrat. Derp.
Basic, what a coincidence, I’m having brunch with Gavin at the moment, so I asked him your question. He said,
“No one made me King, but people like Basic made me Governor through their propensity for complainant over action. I thank him from the bottom of my heart.”
I’m not sure they are being overlooked. It’s a feature not a bug?
California appears to be stuck between a rock and a hard place? As a parent of a soon-to-be college student, I am understanding the frustration my friends have – sort of. My Bay Area friends want their kids to go to UCs, but they cannot get in. They cannot get in because population growth has outpaced space at UCs. Also more students go to college now than before, percentage wise.
Now, when I say their kids cannot get in, that’s not actually true. These parents have kids with high SATs (which don’t matter to UCs), perfect grades, multiple extra-curriculars. They can get in…to Riverside, Santa Cruz, Merced, maybe Davis. BUT they want their kids at Berkeley or UCLA.
California wants to expand UC enrollment and is pushing for expansion, and the UCs often push back. If CA wants to expand UC enrollment (a worthy goal!) then it simply needs to provide the funding for students to INCLUDE housing for the additional students.
https://edsource.org/2022/lawmakers-want-university-of-california-to-enroll-7000-new-students-this-fall-uc-balks/668402
Hartmann is rarely right about anything, this time she got it. Simple solution: the courts must require UCSB to lower their admissions numbers by 30% with a multimillion dollar fine per day of inaction and that money put in to the SBC general fund to be used to mitigate the variety of problems that the oversubscribed and dysfunctional university is creating.
As a Gaucho myself and someone who has worked with the institution on partnership I am deeply disappointed in the (lack of) management of Yang and his staff. They are worse than useless and have no regard that I can see for the community and UCSB’s negative impacts and track record of zero interest in community engagement. Specific departments are much better to deal with but they almost have to operate independently of the Chancellor’s office to get anything done.
The UC system generally and UCSB in particular are failing miserably to carry out their mission in this state.
I do agree with your 12:18 comment except for the rando dollar stuff you tossed off.