Berkeley Tree Sitters

The biggest threat to Cal football isn't USC -- it's Cal's students.

Cal is in the process of badly needed renovations of its awful athletic facilities, but their plan includes building a new athletic center where there currently exists a small grove of mostly oak trees. Of course, when you tell Cal students that trees are going to be chopped down to make room for football players, you know there's going to be trouble. However, their campaign is based predominantly on lies and misinformation. What follows is the truth:

The trees in question were planted by the university, most of them either concurrently with the stadium or well after the stadium was built. There is hard photographic evidence that there are no more than four trees in that grove that predate the stadium itself, which is only about 80 years old. There is not a single credible source who says otherwise. Of those four trees, two are in the lower grove and won't be disturbed, one is a redwood that will be relocated (the oaks cannot be relocated, but redwoods have a good chance of survival), and the last (which is one of the oldest) is going to be removed regardless of whether the stadium plan goes forward because it is showing signs of distress and is dying. Thus, the plan calls for the destruction of absolutely zero trees that are over 100 years old.

Bottom line -- there is absolutely nothing extraordinary about the trees in that grove, other than the fact that they exist in Berkeley, where people get their panties in a bunch when it is suggested that trees be removed in the interests of the university and/or the athletic program. If they were removing the trees and building a museum, this would not be a problem.

Of course, there has been all sorts of misinformation spread about this -- in part simply by virtue of biased people making stuff up to strengthen their arguments or make their cause seem more legitimate, but also no doubt in part by the people who own homes in the area and who are throwing every silly lawsuit they can at the university. (They have gone as far as forming an organization designed to protect the Tightwad Hill view, since the proposed stadium renovation would partially obscure the view of the field from Tightwad Hill...they have actually sued the university claiming that they don't have a right to construct the facilities in a way that would compromise Tightwad Hill...unbelievable). This is hardly the little guy standing up against the big bad university. There are a lot of wealthy people and local government interests at play here, and they are spreading misinformation.

The plan calls for the removal of 91 trees, and the 142 new trees to be planted, many of which will be located around the new athletic center. How this is somehow detrimental to the environment and ecological resources on campus is completely baffling to me.

Arrogant as the university may be (and of course they are), drawing the line at this particular place is not only arbitrary, but it is extremely detrimental to Cal, and to Cal's athletic program, which is just now coming into its own as being worthy of respect. This, of course, is something that the tree sitters care absolutely nothing about...but the fact remains that the football program under Jeff Tedford is becoming a significant source of income for Cal and the athletic program generally. The athletic facilities are absurdly outdated and of notoriously poor quality, and the Cal football program is consistently losing top recruits as a result. Given that it is currently college football recruiting season, the timing of the hissy fit going on in the oak trees could not be worse or more damaging to Cal.

Though football revenue does channel into the athletic program, the school does benefit insofar as money from the general fund is not needed to fund athletics. Very few university athletic programs are able to fully support themselves. Most dip into the general fund. The rebirth of Cal football has Cal well on its way to a fully self supported athletic program, which is good for all students -- even those who don't care at all about athletics.

Aside from the important financial interests at stake, it should be noted that while people who protest things like this don't tend to be big football fans, there are tens of thousands of students and alumni who do care about Cal football. I can't help but feel that the tree sitters get at least a little bit of satisfaction out of thumbing their noses at these people. From what I can tell, this protest is as much about hostility toward athletics (particularly big time athletics like football) as it is about defense of the trees. While I think that a lot of these people are genuinely misinformed, I can't help but feel that most of them simply don't care. This is the issue du jour, an opportunity to hang out with your fellow "progressive" friends and feel like you are fighting the good fight. Normally, I'm honestly all for that sort of thing...but this time, the kids seem to be doing more harm than good.