I was talking to Mrs. Fugawe last night about my personal threshold to return to unmodified normal times activity. I think my conditions are receiving the vaccine and substantially reduced community spread in my area. If things go right over the next few months, I think it could be as early as this summer leading to a fairly normal football season.

I was listening to an epidemiologist on the radio saying that the effectiveness of the vaccines may be reliant on a quick strike deployment to tamp it out, and that a slow deployment will put pressure on the virus to mutate and give it time and hosts to do so. Right now we are distributing a million doses a week but need to be distributing 2 million per day. He was also saying that we think the vaccine has a ramp up time to effectiveness in a person possibly of a couple months and we don’t know if vaccinated people can still spread it, which means social distance and masks may need to be a thing for vaccinated people until most people are vaccinated or recovered. Estimates for achieving herd immunity range from 65-95%, so perhaps for the public will make it their New Years resolution to listen to doctors and scientists and the politicians make it theirs to stop bickering and do their job.

The order includes but is not limited to collegiate. There’s also Rivercats operations and at least used to be groups doing “private” youth sports camps and adult beer leagues, mainly in West Sac as I remember. I mean, maybe this was pointed at Aggie hoops, but possible it was really to manage one of those other groups.

UCD and city of Davis have probably one of the best testing and health campaigns in the country and results to show for it, but the situation is much different in Woodland and West Sac. Perhaps the county order was written with those communities in mind more so than Davis. Woodland and Davis have smallish hospitals, I don’t think West Sac has one, which leaves the county as a whole pretty reliant on hospitals in Sacramento county, which hasn’t kept its own porch clean, not to mention the large geographical area to the north and east that maybe aren’t taking things so seriously but are also competing for Sacramento hospital beds. Just hypothesizing the county’s thought process.

I’m in design and construction (and sometimes operations) of sports and leisure venues, so arenas, hotels, convention halls, attractions, themed restaurants, class A retail - you know all the places people can’t go right now. On the side, I own an event company, mainly weddings and such, which my state says I can operate as usual, but I have elected to cancel my contracts because I think weddings and parties are the biggest problem we have. Some of my competitors disagree and are happy to take the paycheck now, prolong this for everyone, and then have the nerve to point at me and say I’m dragging the economy down. Oy.

As to what businesses are essential, you are right about both over and under reactions. Most retail can operate with mask and capacity restrictions and still be profitable. Your hypothetical bookshop was unlikely to be packed anyway so it doesn’t make as much sense to close it, nor does the owner have a huge incentive to flaunt the rules. By virtue, bars and restaurant dining rooms are a bad idea, but most of them struggle economically with takeout only because their business model relies on tips as wages and it turns out in many cases the food and drink isn’t objectively good on its own; we go there for an experience. For carry out, the wings at BWW aren’t really worth twice the cost of fast food wings and the industry is desperate for us to not notice it all comes out of the same Sysco freezer bag. I think that’s part of why the restaurant lobby is so loud. In theory, a hair salon could operate in relative safety if it was one customer at a time, masks, and limited to cut and wash. In practice, that isn’t profitable because the business model is built around having multiple color blowouts going on. So salon owners allowed to open have a huge incentive to fudge the rules and ultimately some will if left to their own honor. Baseball is kind of the same. In theory it could operate in relative safety, but in practice is everyone going to stop spitting in the dugout and live in a tight bubble? Some coaches and players will rise to that challenge. Others won’t. And they ruin it for everyone.

Agree with your point about helping workers, but don’t want to be too warm and fuzzy on small business owners as a group. Some good ones, but I also know many (specifically restaurant owners) who are bona fide jerks and have earned their karma. In states with a lower minimum wage for tipped workers, the workers who haven’t been reporting their tips found themselves in a jam of not being eligible for much help. Sort of their own doing, but COVID has helped highlight how the restaurant industry needs top to bottom wage and benefit reform.

I feel you. I’m not sure if it’s ignorance so much as open denial but I see the same things in public here. Sadly, I usually just try to move away from the antimask types because engaging just prolongs my exposure. Newsom has been far from perfect and certainly has not come down hard enough on Orange/LA Counties or the southern Central Valley but at least he is doing something, however misguided. My governor denies COVID is a thing and has been sending state police to rough up anyone who publicly disagrees. The unfairness of the whole thing is acute. My day job and the business I own basically rely on mass gatherings and are screwed. It boils my blood that business remains great for the cops, plumbers, and truck drivers that won’t social distance while I follow all the rules and my business still takes a dump because of them. Feels like theft and makes me want to pop them in their unmasked mouth.

Assuming vaccines become widely available in the spring and the public takes them, I think fall 2021 is the earliest the university welcomes the general public back on campus. Right now UCD has compulsory testing and documentation for students and staff, which will probably be in place until community spread subsides. Those measures may be more difficult to impose on the public, which isn’t subject to employee or student discipline. In the world of optics, I don’t think UCD is as worried about currying favor with Newsom as they are about not wanting to contradict UCD Health, which is trying to position itself as a COVID leader. Agree with your point that the short term selfishness and greed by a few has only extended this situation for everyone else.

My guess is it will feel more like a PBS pledge drive with somebody in khakis and a blue button up asking for cash in front a green screen of the arboretum, only it will cutoff every 45 minutes because nobody at CAAA upgraded the Zoom account. If it helps get you in the mood, Bar Bernardo is apparently selling the Wicky Wacky Woo in 4-pack cans now.

My guess is that if UCD really wanted to circumvent Yolo County, they could. They may not have the desire to do so.

agree on introductory ARC classes. Outside of classes, I remember it as a meat market with coeds on the ellipticals making sure everyone saw their midriffs and bros on the weight racks making sure everyone heard them grunting and slamming weights, not necessarily safely. And if you had a question, the ARC staff would disappear faster than a Home Depot employee.

Are the ways in which student fees are spent locked in or are they more advisory in nature? I know with donations there is always fine print that the chancellor can reallocate to other uses without your consent if they wish (and occasionally they do).

Personally, no I don’t think PE or other “fun” classes like tractor driving impede academic progress, and I do believe they have intrinsic value as part of the university experience. What I was getting at is that US News and WSJ type rankings include elements of “cost efficiency” in their algorithms and shaving a few units here or there to possibly get a few people out in 3.75 years may manipulate that a fraction of a point. Personally, I think requiring multiple classes in chemistry, calculus, and foreign language for majors with no practical application is a much bigger waste of time than anything else.

My speculation might be that they want to get rid of classes seen as tangential to core academics so they can maybe push people out the door a quarter sooner since that plays into rankings. I also wouldn't be surprised if there was some level of lobbying from Campus Rec to transition PE to paid recreation. They did a major renovation on the ARC from 2017-19 and I might guess increasing class revenue was part of the performa.

You other point about priority registration is well taken as a campus-wide problem. There are some classes you won't be able to take until your last quarter or maybe never at all if you are not part of a "priority" group. Definitely a supply and demand mismatch for a lot of courses. For all the talk of data, I think there are still a lot of non-data points that go into course offering. Plenty of professors declare they will only teach specific quarters, at specific times, or in specific rooms. I experienced dumb things like room changes because a professor didn't like the light switches in a particular lecture hall, with little concern given that the change impacted the capacity of that and other classes.

If the issue was that assistant coaches didn’t want to teach a couple PE classes anymore, I would question whether their commitment is to teaching their craft or personal prestige, in the same way I take issue with professors who feel teaching undergraduate classes is below them. Exercise walking would be a silly class for someone who’s already works out but I can tell you places like the ARC can be intimidating and unapproachable for someone new to fitness. There’s also value in being well rounded, taking unusual classes unrelated to your major, that I think the bean counters lose sight of.

Interestingly, the “declining enrollment” period coincided with major construction at the ARC, pools, and bowling alley. I bet sections were cancelled due to facility availability rather than lack of real demand.

I agree. Some of this is defensible, like the campus architect charging hours to the project to review plans. But the 6-10% that Mrak Hall skims off every donation and spends on who-knows-what is frustrating.

You are correct it is hard to know what the scope at Bob Foster is from the brief description. Not sure what the Sac construction climate is; nationally labor is better but materials are scarcer than a year ago. AECOM as the general contractor seems like a reasonable choice, much more so than Brown was for the stadium. I think UC functions as their own building inspector, for better or worse. Some cost is self inflicted with the quest for LEED certifications, which are kind of a farce for optics. Based on the little I know, I still think the costs probably include some nice-to-haves, but I’m not upset by this since it is substantially funded by donors. Regardless, it was an impressive fundraising haul in a short period of time.

Finishes can make a huge difference. Looking at comps adjusted for inflation, similar facilities at Montana $280/sf, Sac State $450/sf, UCLA $950/sf, UCD $1150/sf - but it’s not exactly apples to apples because the others didn’t include a practice field. Not out of line if it’s PAC12 level finishes. If it’s more modest finishes, there might have been a hidden driver, like utilities or drainage or something.

Yes, cost includes 45,000 square foot building, natural turf practice field, and renovation of existing locker rooms in Aggie Stadium. Being in the business, this does seem a little high unless there is some unusual mitigation on the site.

I’m sure mileage varies. In my time, PE classes were no pickup spot. The eye candy was at the ARC and PE classes were more nearly the awkward kids who didn’t know which end of the racket to hold. Several of my friends took squash with Bob Biggs and said it was the most profound class they took. But I’m sure some instructors phoned it in and I’m not really trying to make the case for PE so much as criticize the decision process. A transparent policy process exists to cut programs and the admin disregarded it (and said this cut was planned before the pandemic). My issue is they expect students, faculty, alumni, and visitors to respect every policy to a tee, but then they ignore it themselves when convenient and even try to obscure who in particular is making said decisions. And since UCD charges by quarter, not per unit, a 0.5 unit PE class is basically included as a free offering, where it will now be an up-charge through Campus Rec. One more step in the long walk of lowering value for each tuition dollar paid. In my view, a public university is owned by the taxpayers and tuition payers, and the admin are simply the hired help to serve at our pleasure. Somehow they have gotten the mistaken idea that the university is a corporation for their private benefit and that the collective public is something between a customer and indentured servant obliged to offer them tribute for whatever services they see fit. If the Coffee House has to hold public comment sessions when deciding to switch from fresh to packaged guacamole (yes, a real thing), certainly more important issues deserve transparency of process in broad daylight without the decision makers hiding behind a cloak of anonymity. While I agree that the legislature shouldn’t be concerned about one squash class, I think they should be concerned about the broader narrative of the admin sitting on back room decisions and then moving to implement without warning so as to avoid organized opposition.

Unfortunate for UCD, but not unexpected that he moves on. I would have guessed a P5 school his destination, but I can also see how a good job in Canada must look pretty good to Canadians right now. And there may well be some serious troubled waters ahead for UCD athletics. I hope he does well in this endeavor. What will be interesting is to see how May responds. Announced so far is asst director will be interim director and a search committee being formed to fill the position in early 21. If this was a known departure, there may already be a successor on deck for a quick strike. If it’s a real search, will be interesting to see if the committee focuses on qualifications or tries to shoehorn a diversity hire.