TOWN HALL NOV. 29
FOR FACULTY, STAFF

Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi has invited faculty and staff to a town hall meeting Tuesday (Nov. 29), for an open discussion with her; Ralph J. Hexter, provost and executive vice chancellor; and Matt Carmichael, acting police chief.

The town hall is scheduled from 4 to 5:30 p.m. in Freeborn Hall.

In announcing the town hall, Katehi advised faculty and staff of a campus website with background on the Police Department’s use of pepper spray against protesters and the campus’s response.

This will be Katehi’s second town hall in two weeks, having met Nov. 22 with more than 1,000 people, mostly students, also in Freeborn Hall.

One of the speakers at the first town hall delivered what she described as signatures from a change.org petition for the chancellor’s resignation.

Since then, Bess-Carolina Dolmo, a doctoral candidate in biomedical engineering, launched a change.org petition denouncing calls for Katehi’s resignation.

By Dateline staff

UC President Mark G. Yudof announced today (Nov. 28) that UC Davis Professor Emeritus Cruz Reynoso, a former associate justice of the state Supreme Court, will chair the task force that will examine the UC Davis Police Department’s use of pepper spray on protesters.

Noting Reynoso’s credentials as a civil rights attorney and a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2000), Yudof said: “I think Justice Reynoso will be absolutely fair.”

Reynoso joined the faculty of the School of Law in 2001 and was the first to hold the Boochever and Bird Chair for the Study and Teaching of Freedom and Equality.

Yudof is assembling the task force at Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi’s request. The president plans to announce the rest of the membership — students, faculty, staff and Davis community members — at a later date.

Fact-finding has been assigned to William Bratton, who formerly led the New York, Los Angeles and Boston police departments — and Yudof said he saw no conflict in Bratton’s appointment, despite his company’s other work with the UC Office of the President.

Bratton is chairman of the New York-based Kroll Inc., which describes itself as the world’s leading risk consulting company. Yudof said Kroll, in working for UC, primarily carries out background checks of prospective hires.

Bratton’s fact-finding report will go to the task force, which will then make recommendations to Katehi and the president on steps that should be taken to ensure the safety of peaceful protesters on campus. She will present her implementation plan to Yudof.

300 attend regents meeting

Yudof discussed the Reynoso and Bratton appointments during a Board of Regents meeting held via teleconference at UC Davis and three other campuses.

UC Davis hosted its part of the regents meeting in the Activities and Recreation Center Ballroom. Nearly 300 people attended, and a few dozen people demonstrated outside.

The meeting proceeded rather smoothly through the public comments, but, as the regents started their business meeting, the audience in Davis started using the “mic check” system: A person in the audience would make a statement in short phrases, and other audience members would act as human microphones, repeating each phrase — such as asking for more time for public comments.

Regents Chair Sherry Lansing had already extended the comment period to one hour and 45 minutes to accommodate the dozens of speakers in Davis, San Francisco, Merced and Los Angeles.

Many of the speakers appealed for tuition relief, while others urged the regents to be more active in advocating for greater funding for UC. The regents also heard an earful about the pepper spraying at Davis and the police use of batons on protesters at Berkeley.

At the conclusion of public comments, Lansing said: “We hear you and we share your concerns.”

Side-by-side in Sacramento

In regard to UC finances, she said she and other regents would stand side-by-side with students in Sacramento to stop further budget cuts to the UC system.

Lansing called on the two student regents to help organize a march on the Capitol in January, and to join her over the next few weeks in visiting all of the campuses to continue the dialogue with students that began at today’s meeting.

The Davis venue drew the student regents, Alfredo Mireles Jr. from UCSF and Jonathan Stein from Berkeley, and one ex-officio member, state Assembly Speaker John Perez, D-Los Angeles, plus Dan Dooley from the UC Office of the President, where he serves as senior vice president for External Affairs.

Chancellor Katehi and Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Ralph J. Hexter also sat in.

The meeting at Davis occurred the same day that the Occupy UC Davis movement called for a general strike by students, faculty and staff. Pat Turner, UC Davis’ vice provost of Undergraduate Studies, advised that the campus would be open as usual, and students should plan to attend their classes as scheduled — unless the students heard directly from their instructors.

Officials said they expected the university’s highly dedicated faculty to fulfill their professional obligations and act in the best interest of their students.

The protest covered several fronts today: the general strike, the regents meeting and the Occupy UC Davis encampment. A general assembly at noon turned into a march to Dutton Hall, where an estimated 175 people joined a teach-in in the lobby.