UC Pres Yudof on Meister Exposé

Vague:

UCSC: Following up on that, one kind of example that I've been thinking about lately of transparency is this -- UCSC Professor Bob Meister has, like, written this piece, I don't know if you have heard of it, it's called "They Pledged Your Tuition: An Open Letter to UC [Students]."

It is totally untrue, by the way.

UCSC: OK, well then ...

It just came in the other day and we've written a response. It is untrue because we are not allowed to use student fees to pay bonded indebtedness.

UCSC: So what can you tell us here since you have, you know, this smaller number of students that are able to listen to you in person. Where did he come up with this then?

Damned if I know. He took two numbers that, you know, that we had pledged toward debt and when the fees were going up. [inaudible] It's just untrue. We're not allowed to use fees for that purpose. The fees are used for operating expenses of the university. The reason we made these pledges, cause it will lower-if you pledge the whole campuses as opposed to just the residence hall, or whatever, it lowers the interest rate which means students pay less for their dorm rooms and the like. It's just not true, flat-out not true; misinformation.

UCSC: And are you guys going to come out with a response to that?

Yes. We are.

UCSC: You have one?

It's finished I think. . . . You know we just got this this week, you know, and we want to give you accurate information so it takes a couple of days to respond to this-I bet the preparation time is three days to respond to this. I mean this is not a standard story, we have to research our answer and give it to you.