A Sampling of Clips for 
March 13, 2006

* UCSD faculty and staff may obtain a copy of an article by e-mailing the University Communications Office

Shantytowns as a New Suburban Model
The New York Times, March 12 – Teddy Cruz, of UCSD's visual arts department, has been shuttling between suburban San Diego and the shantytowns of Tijuana for more than a decade now. From anthropologists to urban planners eager for an insider's view, visitors pepper him endlessly with requests for tours. But Mr. Cruz is more than a tour guide. From London to Tel Aviv to his own borderland stomping ground here, his ideas about Tijuana's hardscrabble settlements have generated a buzz. In a patchwork of plywood hovels, auto repair shops and hasty additions, Mr. Cruz has found a humane model for rethinking America's suburbs. More

UCSD Professor
Disputes Need for New Airport
North County Times, March 12 -- Lindbergh Field's lone runway is enough to handle San Diego County's air travel demand long into the future, contends a UCSD economics professor, who has taken issue with forecasts a regional agency is using to build a case for a new or expanded airport. Professor Richard Carson said the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority's projections are inflated because they rely on faulty economic assumptions, such as that fares will gradually decline and that people will fly more often as their incomes rise. More

Latino Theater Still Searching for Audience in the Valley, Despite Hispanic Population Gain
Arizona Republic, March 12 -- The Valley's large Hispanic population is not a single audience but several, and marketing theater to them presents unique challenges. On the other hand, companies across the Valley have worked hard to reach out to those audiences, bringing Latin themes onstage. Still, even the most optimistic members of the Latino theater community say it has a long way to go to meet its potential. (Quotes Jorge Huerta, associate chancellor and chief diversity officer at UCSD.) More

Navy’s Secrecy About Development Criticized
San Diego Union-Tribune, March 12 -- Government watchdog groups and others are decrying the secrecy surrounding the Navy's ambitious redevelopment plans for its 14.7-acre property on San Diego Bay. Navy officials will not release the names of the companies bidding on the Navy Broadway Complex project. They are expected to announce the winning bidder March 31. (Quotes Abraham Shragge, a military history professor at UCSD.) More

Regents to Hold Closed-Door Meeting on Pay
San Francisco Chronicle, March 11 -- Despite promises to make its pay practices more open, the University of California Board of Regents plans to meet behind closed doors next week to discuss executive compensation in what appears to be a violation of its own policies. According to the agenda for the Board of Regents' meeting at UCLA, the regents' new compensation committee plans to discuss the "compensation structure for the president and chancellors" in private on Wednesday before the panel considers the issue in open session on Thursday. (Mentions UCSD Chancellor Marye Anne Fox.) More

Scientific Data Flows
from Growing Samoan Volcano
Paramus Post (N.J.), March 12 -- In 1889, Robert Louis Stevenson sailed into the Samoan islands and fell in love with their rugged, verdant peaks and palm-studded, white-sand beaches. With his wife, he purchased 314 acres of jungle, built a house and remained for the rest of his life. Stevenson, of course, was the author of "Treasure Island" and other literary classics, but it's unlikely that he imagined or could fully appreciate the value of a different kind of treasure buried beneath the islands: not gold, jewels or pirate's booty, but new and fundamental knowledge about how the world works. (Quotes Hubert Staudigel, a research geologist at the UCSD's Scripps Institution of Oceanography.) More

Mexican-American Studies Conference Features Talk on Latino Military Recruitment
Boise State Arbiter, March 13 -- Monday and Tuesday of last week marked the sixth annual celebration of the Triennial Mexican American Studies Conference at Boise State. The conference, entitled “Nuestra Historia, Nuestro Futuro” (Our History, Our Future), included educational talks and ended with a discussion by keynote speaker Jorge Mariscal, a professor of Spanish and Chicano Literature at UCSD, who gave a presentation entitled “The Future for Latinos in the Age of Terror,” in the Jordan Ballroom in the Student Union Building. More

Offer Letters from UC Detail Top Hires’ Perks
San Francisco Chronicle, March 13 -- When the University of California recruited UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau two years ago, he was promised at least 1 1/2 years in paid leave when he steps down -- with the opportunity to earn more. UC also agreed to sweeten his health care benefits and give him $150,000 a year in research funding. When UC hired Steven Chu to run the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in 2004, the university agreed to give him a $50,000 "signing bonus," tweak the retirement formula to boost his pension and, in addition to covering his actual moving costs, give him additional money to cover any taxes he might owe on the relocation payment. And the university promised UCSD Medical Center director Richard Liekweg, who was hired in 2003, up to a year's severance pay if he is fired without "good cause" in his first five years. More