03/30/01: Students Lockdown to Protest BFS Development ; 9 Arrested

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April 6, 2001

March 30, 2001

Students Lockdown to Protest BFS Development ; 9 Arrested

By Scott LaBoda and Beth Cope
News Editors

Student protestors blocked access to Claremont University Consortium's (CUC) Pendleton Business Building beginning at 3:30 am Monday in an effort to force negotiations with the CUC administration regarding the development of the Bernard Field Station (BFS). Students blocked all four entrances to the building with cement-filled trash cans weighing upwards of 700 pounds each. The cans were designed to allow one or two students to lock one arm each into a pipe placed inside the cement, using chains and carabiners, in such a way that no one but the attached student could release it. Early Tuesday morning nine of the student protesters were arrested for interfering with and obstructing a business.

The protest was led by the Coalition to Preserve the Bernard Field Station, a five-college student organization, which is dedicated to convincing the colleges to preserve the BFS in its entirety. "We are prepared to be here as long as it takes – ideally we would like a legal agreement with CUC to preserve the field station in perpetuity," Coalition member Matt Gerhart '01 said.

Members of the Coalition, as well as a community group called the Friends of the Bernard Field Station and various individual citizens, have been fighting against the proposed development of the land for the past five years.

Brenda Barham Hill, the CEO of CUC, made the decision to call in the police department. Hill delivered a letter to the students on Monday morning stating that they were "in violation of CUC's disruption and response guidelines," and that "students continuing to block access to Pendleton [would] be placed on summary suspension and referred to their home campuses for judicial action as of noon. Further, those students [would] be immediately subject to arrest."

Barham Hill passed out approximately 30 suspension notices to students close to the entrances a little after noon on Monday, before calling in the police the next morning.

"I wasn't bluffing and I knew that they weren't bluffing," said Barham Hill of her decision to involve the police. She was acting on behalf of the Board of Overseers of CUC, which consists of all of the college presidents, the chairs of each college's Board of Trustees and a few at-large members.

"I consulted with Dr. Robert Tranquada [the chair of the board of Trustees] and most of the presidents," she said. "I had no indication at any time that I had anything but the full support of the presidents and the Board."

Twenty Claremont police officers arrived at the Pendleton building at around 7 am on Tuesday morning, after initial discussions with Barham Hill began the night before. Also present for backup were officers from the LA County Sheriff's department, the Covina Police Department, the West Covina Police Department, and the Pomona Police Department. The CPD press release estimated the backup number of officers at 20, but more than thirty were actually present on the scene.

Before arrests were made, Barham Hill warned those students closest to the doors, offering them an opportunity to move away from the doors and thus avoid arrest. "I was unhappy that we had to arrest anyone," she said, "but was happy that it was so few. I was also pleased that some students chose not to be arrested."

Nine students, who remained blocking the doors, were taken in police vans to the City of Industry jail. Those students cooperated with the police processing and were held only a few hours.

The six students who were locked into the cement trash cans, however, were unable to be arrested, as they could not be extricated from their blockades without causing physical harm. Police moved the cans and students away from the entrances using a dolly and carrying the students, and in one case were forced to use a forklift that happened to be parked nearby.

Police took pictures of these students, saying that they would be arrested later, but as of Wednesday evening none had been charged.

The students who were actually arrested have been charged with trespassing, and a court date has been set for May 1. As for legal defense, Coalition member Liz Lindsley SC '04 said, "I have heard that there's two or three lawyers that have said they're willing [to defend the students]."

The students continued their protests after the arrests, holding rallies and press conferences, and marching across the campuses attempting to speak to college presidents. Coalition members say that they knew coming into this that it was going to take a while, and actually chose to do it now so as to have sufficient time before the end of the year.

From early in the protest, it became clear that both sides would be unyielding. Students asserted from the start that they would not leave the building grounds until the Board agreed to negotiate with them. They were surprised to be arrested so quickly and given so little in the way of negotiation. But the Board stood fast in their previous decisions. "We can't re-open this issue every six months because someone else wants to talk about it," Tranquada said.

While Barham Hill spoke with members of the Board throughout the protests, no meetings of the Board were called. Barham Hill told protestors repeatedly, at the site and in meetings, that she was not authorized by her superiors to talk about BFS.

The land on which the field station is now located was purchased in 1925 by Ellen Scripps for Scripps College. Donald McKenna later directed a purchase of the land for the CUC with the intention that it be used for future colleges. In the 1970s, tax laws changed to include unused land owned by educational institutions as taxable property. The BFS was created as an interim solution to put the land to educational use and therefore to avoid paying taxes on the site until the land was developed.

Coalition members argue that preservation of the land is more important than the development plans of the colleges. "It is priceless as a nearby educational resource for undergraduate biology students, and invaluable in an age when environmental destruction continues to accelerate . . . Yet the presidents look at this thriving plant and animal community and see only a vacant lot to be built on," reads one Coalition flyer.

CUC contends that to ignore opportunities to develop the field station would thwart the intentions of its donors. "Colleges that rely on past and present gifts for roughly one third of their operating budget cannot just repudiate the good-faith agreements they make with their donors," President Stanley and Dean of Students Ann Quinley wrote in an email to all Pomona students on Wednesday.

Protestors contest that the Board is acting unilaterally in decisions that affect all of the college and community, and opposing the will of the students and faculty. "Guess what, CUC, this is a democracy," they chanted throughout the day on Monday. "We expect the college to represent the students and faculty, not the trustees," Gerhart said. "They have no attachment to this community."

President of Pomona College Peter Stanley said of the Board's decision, "one takes the opinion of the faculty on academic matters very seriously, but land use is a separate matter."

Erin Quies SC '01 said that President of Claremont McKenna Pamela Gann offered a similar opinion: "She said that this was not a democracy because [students] only go here for four years. The trustees are the stakeholders involved."

Protestors confronted President Stanley outside Alexander Hall around noon on Wednesday, expressing concern over their lack of ability to speak with anyone who had negotiation authority. Stanley told the protestors that they should speak with Barham Hill. They responded that she had advised them to speak with their college presidents about the issue. He appeared surprised that she would have referred students to him, saying that, as only one member of the Board of Overseers, he was in no position of authority to negotiate.

"It's not fair [to] the students for each one of us to be telling them 'go somewhere else," Barham Hill said as she addressed the confusion later in the day. "I've not been trying to steer people away to avoid them. I'm trying to find a way to convey to students that I just don't have authority over some things and I'm not trying to pass the buck," she said.

Recently, CUC signed an agreement with Friends of the Bernard Field Station, a separate, primarily citizen group, guaranteeing protection of 45 acres of the land for 50 years, among other concessions.

Student protestors were quick to point out that they were unaffiliated with this group and that they found the agreement unacceptable. "That agreement was only signed by four members of the Friends, so it wasn't even representative of that group," Lindsley said. "Our group had no strong affiliation with them and disagreed with [their tactics and goals]."

Further, Coalition members argued that development on any part of BFS would cause extensive damage to the ecosystems currently in place there. "Plant and animal communities need large plots of contiguous land to remain healthy," read a flier. "Building on ANY part of BFS will be ecological disaster, and cannot be allowed."

"We're hear to say that the settlement is unacceptable. Development and preservation can't go hand in hand," organizer Ruth Cusack SC '03 shouted at a rally on Monday.

What will happen now is largely uncertain. Students have invested themselves heavily in this protest and do not plan to give up easily. They are still camped out on the lawn in front of the Pendleton Building. Administrators, as well, have made no signs of wavering in their position.

Barham Hill said yesterday afternoon that a statement had been circulated among the presidents to be approved for release later in the day. Stanley said at 4 pm that he expected a statement in the next few hours. But as of 9 am on Thursday nothing has been produced, and Gann's office said that the statement was still being worked on.