Affirmative Action Dispute Halts Meeting of UC Regents

SAN FRANCISCO —  The issue of affirmative action literally brought the University of California Board of Regents meeting to a halt Thursday after an emotional group of students--insistent that they all be allowed to speak--refused to obey police orders to disperse.

The protest came as the regents prepared to consider a new report showing that the makeup of the UC student body could change dramatically if admissions policies that consider race and ethnicity were replaced.

If the university instead gave special consideration to low-income students--regardless of race--the preliminary report found that enrollment of Asian Americans could grow as high as 58% of the student body, while the number of blacks and Latinos would significantly drop.

But trouble broke out even before regents began their discussion, when students insisted that the board allow every interested speaker to address the subject of affirmative action. When the board attempted to end the public comment period after about a dozen students had spoken, shouting broke out and board Chairman Howard H. Leach temporarily adjourned the meeting.

“Shame on you!” students yelled at the board members as most of them left the meeting room. UC police officers lined up between the crowd and the board and told students to leave. When one young woman refused to back away, an officer grabbed her arm, spun it around her back and--despite the intervention of UC Provost Walter E. Massey--pushed her into the hallway.

“Let her go! Let her go!” the crowd chanted as Massey exchanged stern words with the officer who had held the woman. The woman, who was taken away in handcuffs, was later released. Massey later said he had been trying to tell police “to stop twisting her arm.”

Twenty minutes later, after UCLA Chancellor Charles E. Young counseled the students that they had made their point and should honor the board’s request and take their seats, the regents resumed their meeting. They launched into the latest in a series of discussions about how affirmative action works at UC. The board took no action, but the outburst served as a sharp reminder of the subject’s volatility.

*

“I personally don’t hold it against any person at this university who feels emotional” about affirmative action, Regent David Flinn said as he brought the meeting back to order. “I find myself disappointed in recent months in some of the rhetoric that leaves out logic and [provokes] emotion. . . . But on the other side of the coin, people who accuse those who are looking into alternatives to the programs that we have who use words like ‘racist’ and ‘angry white males’ do us the same disservice.”

Since January, when Regent Ward Connerly proposed that the board re-examine UC’s affirmative action policies and called for an end to race- and gender-based preferences, the board has been studying the issue.

Some legislators and others have suggested that family income would be a better factor than race for UC to consider as it seeks to enroll a diverse student body.

On Thursday, as the board continued that discussion, it received a preliminary analysis of what might occur if race and ethnicity were replaced solely by socioeconomic factors in the admission of UC students.

The analysis, requested by UC President Jack W. Peltason, concluded that when admissions officers consider economic status in addition to academic merit, enrollment of African American students could drop by as much as 50%. Under that approach, blacks would make up less than 3% of the student body.

The study also found that Latino enrollment, now about 13%, could drop to about 11%.

The number of Asian American students would increase between 15% and 25% across the university system, and bring the total number of Asian American students to between 48% and 58% of those enrolled. Whites would increase about 5%.

The report also found that there are drawbacks for the UC system if it chooses to go that route.

The analysis found that there would be a significant increase in the number of low-income students--so many, in fact, that current levels of student financial aid and student services would not be sufficient to accommodate the increased need. Moreover, the analysis said, an admissions process that looks only at socioeconomic factors would result in a general lowering of standardized test scores and grade-point averages among entering freshmen.

The analysis concludes that such an admissions system would not be acceptable if UC is required to reflect the state’s diversity.

“The parental income and level of parent’s education can be used to achieve some of the diversity sought for the class of new freshmen” at the university, the draft report said. “However, it cannot be relied upon alone to replace ethnicity in the admissions process.”

The so-called “California civil rights initiative,” which would ban racial preferences in government hiring, contracts and public education, is expected to qualify for the November, 1996, ballot. Partly because of that initiative, UC officials have begun to explore alternatives.

But several students who addressed the board Thursday called upon the board to stand firm. About 200 students arrived at the meeting after marching from UC Berkeley to the Laurel Heights campus of UC San Francisco--a demonstration organized by the UC Student Assn. to protest threats to affirmative action and financial aid. Only a fraction of those students were allowed into the crowded meeting room, which prompted some tempers to flare.

Still, several students addressed the board with earnest concern.

“We in the UC need to continue to lead the effort to reduce racism in this society,” said Forgey Wells, a UC Riverside student who was one of several who called upon the regents to defend affirmative action programs from attack.

Jioni Palmer, a second-year political science student at UCLA, agreed.

“The retreat from race that we are witnessing, which began with the Bakke decision, says that racism does not matter and says that what racism does exist is individual, not institutional, and stems from attitudes and ideas rather than power,” he said. “That simply is not the case.”

Board Chairman Leach announced that the public comment period was over after a dozen students had addressed the board. Students grew angry when Leach would not allow three more students to speak.

*

Apparently not all the regents agreed with Leach’s decision. After Leach and other regents left the room, Regent Alice J. Gonzales and new student Regent Eddie Gomez from UC Riverside remained behind.

“You have regents here who are staying with you because they believe in democracy,” Gomez, who in July officially will be sworn in, told the crowd as some students chanted, “We want democracy, not hypocrisy.”

Young, the UCLA chancellor who has been outspoken in his strong support of affirmative action programs, was among a very few administrators who remained in the meeting room after the regents filed out. Stepping into the audience, he tried to calm students while he let them know that he agreed with many of their views.

“This is a matter to be dealt with rationally. It’s not something to be dealt with in chants and slogans,” Young told them. “Let’s not shout at people about it.”

Cesar Cruz, a fourth-year student at UC Irvine, sought Young’s advice before he would agree to sit down. He and others were worried that if they were forced to leave the boardroom, as police officers were initially demanding, they would not be allowed back in.

“We came for 400 miles and they walked out,” he said of the board. “What kind of hypocrisy is that?”