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INSIDE & OUTSIDE, CSU TRUSTEES GET THE NEWS
“WE ARE NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE”
Fed up with an administration whose actions are tearing down the California State University, more than 1000 CSU faculty members and 500 supporters among the CSU staff, students and others took the CSU Board of Trustees meeting by storm Nov. 15.
They called on the Trustees to sign a “Pledge for the Future of the CSU” to end executive perks, give the money to student instruction, roll back student fees, and negotiate fair contracts with the faculty and other CSU employees.
The great majority of protestors engaged in a loud picket line and rally outside the Chancellor’s building on Golden Shore in Long Beach while a smaller group entered the Trustees meeting chamber to deliver the Pledge.
The climax of the day occurred just after noon when 22 faculty members entered the Trustees’ “horseshoe,” the forbidden center of several concentric circles of wood-paneled seats for top CSU executives, to hand each Trustee a copy of the Pledge that they were asked to sign.
Then the 22 unfurled a banner that read “Sign the Pledge,” linked arms and stood silently while State Senator Gloria Romero spoke. She concluded, “The next time you hear the din of democracy outside, go outside and learn what it’s all about. That’s the American Dream out there.”
When Romero finished speaking, the protestors silently sat in the horseshoe, and waited. Students and supporters in the public seating area inside, as well as protestors outside the meeting room windows, cheered them and shouted at the Trustees to sign the pledge.
For some 10 minutes a stand-off ensued. Tension grew. The crowd chanted, exhorting the Trustees to take a stand by signing the pledge, but not one moved to do so. Reed, Trustees Chair Roberta Achtenberg and Trustee Debra Farar were heard conferring, asking each other what should they do. Other Trustees whispered among themselves not knowing what to do; no one moved.
Finally, unable to do business and unwilling to engage the protestors on the issues at hand, the Trustees took a hasty vote to adopt all the motions before them today – which included the 2007/08 state budget proposal and a new executive transition perquisite — then adjourned and fled the room. The crowd cheered as they left.
Ignoring that power to the room had been shut down, the 22 faculty, who included CFA’s president and vice president and faculty from all ranks, took the seats of the Trustees. The outraged students were invited to come to the table. CFA President John Travis proceeded to act on motions. The “real” Trustees voted to rollback student fees to 2001 levels, to bargain fair contracts with CSU unions, and to eliminate ALL executive perk programs and return the money to the university.
“Faculty members at every campus can describe the impact the bad decisions and misplaced priorities of this CSU administration has had on them and on their students. They are cutting campus budgets at Humboldt, Sacramento, L.A., Dominguez Hills, and East Bay, while they pay former executives millions for nothing long after they have left the CSU,” said Travis after the event.
“We faculty can’t keep on talking to each other and coming here allowing the Trustees give us a mere three minutes to present our case after which they forget about us,” said Travis after the event. “We must act in equal measure to the seriousness of the problems facing the CSU.
“It’s not our nature as academics to disrupt meetings. But we have our responsibility to fight for our students, for the university and for ourselves and our families. That responsibility is what moved us today to send the Trustees running,” Travis concluded.
Earlier in the day, just after 10 am, between 1500 and 2000 marchers emerged en masse at the top of the Golden Shore Dr. bridge adjacent to the chancellor’s office. There they unfurled a giant banner exhorting freeway drives to “Take a Stand for the California State University.”
This demonstration organized by CFA was the largest gathering ever to protest at a Trustees meeting. Marchers carried more than 600 picket signs. Twelve-foot tall delegation banners showcased representatives from each of the 23 campuses and 15-foot tall marionette’s depicted Chancellor Reed. The San Bernardino Radical cheerleaders tossed pompoms made of CSI: CSU Crime Scene yellow tape. On arrival at the Chancellor’s glass-façade office building in view of the Queen Mary, the participants banged drums, chanted, blew whistles and made all manner of other noise in an effort to let the Trustees inside know that their meeting would not be business as usual.
Protestors called from outside on the executives to come out to talk with the crowd, to “hear our voice.” San Diego Union Tribune writer Lisa Petrillo reported she was told by CSU spokesperson Clara Potes-Fellow, “They (the Trustees) didn’t need to go outside. You could hear them inside very well.”
After several laps around the Chancellor’s office courtyard, the huge rally outside headed across the street for speeches and entertainment. Emcee Cecil Canton, a criminal justice professor from CSU Sacramento, and stage manager David Bradfield, a music professor from CSU Dominguez Hills,
led the outside festivities, which included faculty testimonials, music by Indigenous Concrete and guest speakers including Assemblymember Judy Chu, newly elected State Senator Mark Ridley-Thomas, Carson city councilmember Mike Gibson, new CTA Secretary-Treasurer Dean Vogel, and Maria Elena Durazo, Executive Secretary of the L.A. County Federation of Labor, and other labor leaders, as well as Faculty Trustee Craig Smith and CSU Academic Senate Chair Marshelle Thobaben.
Bradfield told the crowd, “Make more noise to support the valiant people inside who are trying to get the Trustees to listen to us.” Throughout the outside entertainment program faculty and students took turns
marching through the courtyard at the entrance to the Trustees’ chamber. From inside, the executives and public observers could see zealous picketers holding signs, and effigies of Reed up to the windows. Skeletons in caps and gowns pressed signs reading “CSU skeleton crew: Worked to death.”
At one point a group burst into a side door with signs and chanting “Reed, Reed, Stop the Greed.” Faculty and students in the room rose to clap with them in unison until the door was secured. At one point during the outside activities Canton abruptly stopped the music to announce, “it’s a bird…it’s a plane… it’s a CFA banner,” as a propeller plane flew by towing a 25-foot “Stop the Rip-Offs” banner.
When it became apparent around noon that the Trustees were stalling the meeting in an attempt to wait out those on the outside, the crowd grew noticeably more intense and began chanting, “let them speak,” while making one final push into the courtyard to let those inside know that while they may be returning to campus for the day, this is certainly not over.
In addition to the faculty, staff and students more than 25 news media outlets made the trek to the rally. They interviewed CFA leaders, faculty members in the crowd, and students to learn just why we are upset with the administration.
“We want everyone to know,” Travis said, “that whatever he or she did today was of great value. Our action inside and outside the meeting was entirely linked. Everyone should know that this was a successful action on both ends.”
The rally can perhaps be best summed up in the extremely candid statement of one student as she walked back to her car at the end of the rally. “That was frickin’ awesome. If they don’t get the message this time we will just have to come back and let them know one more time that this is our university and we aren't gonna take it.
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