Campus Releases Protest Spending Estimate

UC Berkeley has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on security at the nearly year-old protest near Memorial Stadium, campus officials said yesterday.

An estimated $367,000 has funded extra police shifts, private security guards and two fences around the oak grove where protesters have been living since Dec. 2 in opposition to a proposed athletic center, said Executive Director of Public Affairs Dan Mogulof.

The estimate, which is based on a preliminary analysis of accounting records, also includes costs for cleaning the area, equipment such as lights, and other miscellaneous expenses.

All of the money comes from a campus risk pool that is set aside every year to cover unforeseen costs tied to protests and other activities, said Vice Chancellor of Administration Nathan Brostrom in an e-mail.

Of the total security costs, officials said about $100,000 went toward paying for police services at the grove that are not part of normal on-duty operations.

UCPD Assistant Chief Mitch Celaya said extra checkups on the area have forced the department to spend less time patrolling elsewhere and to bring in officers from other campuses during games. “During the fall we had a spike in violent crimes and we direct our police resources to that,” he said. “We only have so many officers.”

UC police supervised the construction of a fence around the grove Aug. 29 that officials said was designed to prevent clashes between football fans and tree-sitters. At that time, two independent security guards were hired to provide around-the-clock surveillance.

A second fence erected Nov. 8, which university attorney Charles Olson earlier described as the first step toward removing the protesters, extended the security perimeter around the grove. The number of guards was then increased to seven.

Installing the two fences cost a combined $117,000, Mogulof said, and the campus has paid $125,000 for the services of the private guards.

The estimates do not include costs associated with the pending lawsuits against the proposed athletic center.

If the project is allowed to proceed, the price of construction could be $4 million to $6 million more than originally planned due to inflation that occurred during the litigation, Brostrom said.

Protest leader Zachary RunningWolf said the estimates of police costs, especially considering a recent flurry of arrests, seemed low.

“They are using vast resources to harrass us and jail us,” he said.

Officials have said they have not yet considered forcibly removing the protesters. A ruling on the athletic center lawsuits is expected late this year.

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