Dear Editor:

As members of the TAPS advisory committee, we assert the cost of the new West Entry Parking Structure is not $30 million as reported. Including debt service, the cost is about $60 million.

Who paid for the new parking lot? It was not paid for by campus funds. You and I paid for it as did everyone who drives a car to campus. It is time for UC Davis to stop charging us for new parking structures and parking spaces. When spaces are destroyed by construction, we pay for replacement spaces. From 1999-00 to 2003-04, 1,561 spaces were destroyed. The West Entry Parking Structure provides 1,552 spaces.

Are these costs too high? Yes. Sacramento State is building a structure with twice the spaces for essentially the same costs. Why are our costs so much more? The answer: West Entry Parking Structure is prettier than the one at Sacramento State. Give us a break. Parkers shouldn't have to pay for beauty. Beauty is enjoyed by all of us. Besides, the new garage is not beautiful.

Who should pay for parking structures? For new buildings and major renovations, there should be a small assessment, about 4.5 percent of the cost of the project, to pay for parking lots, roads, electrical and phone lines. This is not new. Stanford has been doing it this way for years. Projects destroy existing parking spaces and create additional demands for services.

Because of the way UC Davis funds parking structures, faculty, employees and students are financing campus development.

Judith Stern

professor of nutrition, internal medicine

Cindy Schulze

Law Library assistant

Dear Editor:

The article in the May 5 issue of Dateline ("Campus joins UC biodefense lab proposal") contains a bit of irony: The plan to locate the Biodefense center at Experimental Test Site 300 at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory places it in the midst of an area where a pathogenic mold/fungus, Coccidioides immitis, resides in the soil.

This organism is the causative agent of Coccidioidomycosis also known as San Joaquin or Valley Fever. C. immitis itself is on the Select List of bioterrorist agents and has led to disease among humans at Test Site 300 and for which UC and the regents have been confronted with legal liability.

Demosthenes Pappagianis

professor of medical microbiology, immunology