UC Berkeley can admit as many students as it had initially planned this fall after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a unanimously passed bill into law on Monday.
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SB 118, which retroactively prevents student enrollment at public universities from being treated as a project under the California Environmental Quality Act, passed with 69-0 and 33-0 support in the California Assembly and Senate, respectively.
Now that Newsom has signed the bill, UC Berkeley would no longer need to comply with an Alameda County court ruling that the school must slash enrollment by 3,000 students this fall. The university said last month it would have to reject around 5,000 applicants this spring in order to do so.
"I'm grateful to the Legislature for moving quickly on this critical issue – it sends a clear signal that California won’t let lawsuits get in the way of the education and dreams of thousands of students, our future leaders and innovators," Newsom said in a statement on Monday.
Save Berkeley's Neighborhoods, which sued the university in 2019 alleging a $126 million construction project violated the California Environmental Quality Act, in part, because officials didn't consider the potential side effects of increased enrollment, said in a statement to KCBS Radio earlier on Monday that it hoped Newsom wouldn't sign the bill.
The California Supreme Court, by a 4-2 ruling on March 3, stayed an Alameda County judge's ruling that UC Berkeley needed to slash enrollment in order to comply with state law. The legislation Newsom signed Monday will be applied retroactively to the ruling.
"While politicians have been saying that CEQA views students as 'pollutants' the real issue is that population growth, students or otherwise, causes environmental impacts that need to be analyzed and mitigated," Save Berkeley's Neighborhoods President Phil Bokovoy wrote in a statement on Monday, prior to Newsom's signing.
"Increased population density – for any development – results in environmental impacts that must be analyzed," Bokovoy continued. "This misguided bill gives the UC a unique free pass to avoid analyzing impacts associated with its own enrollment decisions directly impacting population density on campus and in the surrounding communities."
Berkeley Chancellor Carol Christ said in a statement on Monday that the university remains "committed to continuing our efforts to address a student housing crisis through new construction of below market housing." She thanked the Legislature for its "quick and effective response" following the California Supreme Court ruling earlier this month.
"We look forward to working in close, constructive collaboration with our partners in Sacramento in order to advance our shared interest in providing California students with an exceptional experience and education," Christ said.
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