Lawmakers to vote on fix to increase UC Berkeley enrollment

California lawmakers are fast-tracking a proposal that could allow the University of California, Berkeley, to admit as many students as it had planned to for the fall semester despite a recent judicial freeze on enrollment

University of California Berkeley Enrollment (Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

California lawmakers on Monday were fast-tracking a proposal that could allow the University of California, Berkeley, to admit as many students as it had planned to for the fall semester — despite a court-ordered cap on enrollment stemming from a dispute with neighbors who sued UC Berkeley over its growth.

The state Senate and Assembly were scheduled to vote on legislation giving public universities more time and flexibility to comply with required state environmental reviews before judges can resort to imposing caps on student enrollment.

The bill is retroactive, meaning that if Gov. Gavin Newsom signs it, all court decisions affecting enrollment — including the cap on UC Berkeley's new freshmen — would be unenforceable.

The prestigious public university announced last month it was being forced to reject 5,000 applicants this spring so UC Berkeley could enrollment by 3,000 students to comply with an Alameda County judge's ruling freezing student enrollment at 2020-21 levels. The university has since lowered the figure of applicants it plans to reject who would have been accepted to about 2,600.

The California Supreme Court declined to block the lower court's ruling in a decision earlier this month.

The upholding of the freeze on UC Berkeley enrollment stunned state lawmakers and parents and anxious applicants expecting to receive admissions decisions soon for entry as freshmen this fall.

UC Berkeley officials pleaded with legislators for an emergency fix while the university appeals the case that generated the enrollment freeze, a process that could take months and would not resolve the current situation.

The events leading to the legislation began last year when Alameda County Superior Court Judge Brad Seligman ordered the university to suspend construction of a housing and classroom project and to cap enrollment at its 2020-21 level of just over 42,000 students.

He sided with Berkeley residents who had sued the university, saying it had failed to examine the impact of its growth on noise, safety and housing as required under the California Environmental Quality Act.

The 1970 law requires state and local agencies to evaluate and disclose significant environmental effects of projects and to find ways to lessen those effects. It’s aimed at protecting the environment, but critics have said the law is often used to delay projects and boost construction costs, even for environmentally beneficial projects.

UC Berkeley, like much of the rest of California, has an affordable housing problem resulting from decades of under-building.

On-campus housing at UC Berkeley is extremely limited and many students live off campus. Rents are expensive, especially for apartments closer to campus, while residents grumble over the added traffic, noise and housing costs brought by an increased student body.

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Har reported from Marin County, California.