NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) – Recent pro-Palestinian protests at the City College of New York cost CUNY at least $3 million in damages and added security, a school official told the City Council.
The price tag of the demonstrations in April and early May was revealed during recent testimony by Hector Batista, the chief operating officer of CUNY.
Located in Hamilton Heights, City College is the flagship university of CUNY, a public university system funded by New York taxpayers.
“In total, I’d say we’re upwards of $3 million in spending,” Batista told City Council members, the New York Post reported Tuesday.
The damages alone reportedly top $1 million, including $350,000 in destruction caused by a protester tossing a flare onto the recently replaced roof of the City College administration building. The bill is also said to include $250,000 for vandalism like broken windows and furniture, as well as $600,000 for spray-painted surveillance cameras.
The cost also includes fencing erected on campus and a contract for added security at the school to support public safety officers, officials said.
“It’s costing over $3 million — money that should be going to our academic institution and lifting up our students,” said City Council Member Eric Dinowitz, who heads the Higher Education Committee.
While Columbia University received the lion share of media coverage overs its protest encampments against Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza, there were also major disruptions and an encampment at City College, just blocks away.
Indeed, on April 30—as police were raiding occupied Hamilton Hall at Columbia—more than 170 people were arrested at City College’s campus. Just over 100 were arrested at Columbia that night.