Uc Davis

In light of the terrible financial crisis at our California universities, I feel the need to rescue UC Davis, whose administrators are, according to The Times, negotiating a price with the Kroll security firm in New York for none other than former LAPD Chief Bill Bratton to fly West and tell us what went wrong on the day that students were pepper sprayed. I can save the university a hefty Kroll consulting fee by suggesting that the administrators carefully peruse a few of the newspaper articles of the past week and all will be revealed to them.

Members of a University of California faculty group on Wednesday voiced opposition to the hiring of former Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton to lead an investigation into the pepper spraying of student protesters at UC Davis, arguing that his background made him an inappropriate choice. The professors also complained that faculty and students were not consulted, and asserted that UC President Mark G. Yudof's involvement in selecting Bratton posed a conflict. "The office of the president should not be investigating itself in this matter, when one thing that needs to be investigated is what role the office had," said UC Santa Cruz professor Robert Meister, president of the Council of UC Faculty Assns.

Former Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton will head a University of California-sponsored investigation into the controversial pepper-spraying of student protesters last week at UC Davis, university officials announced Tuesday. Bratton is to lead an independent review and report his findings within a month, UC President Mark G. Yudof said. Bratton is chairman of the New York-based Kroll security consulting firm, which is being hired by UC for a fee that is still under negotiation, officials said.

A slap on the wrist Re "Two Davis officers put on leave; UC president 'appalled' by tactics," Nov. 21 UC President Mark G. Yudof was appalled by the tactics of two UC Davis campus police officers who used pepper spray on students. The powers that be promptly responded by placing the officers on paid leave. So let me get this straight: These two officers who appalled Yudof are being punished with paid time off? I hope that when I make mistakes at work, my superiors will give me a paid vacation, and a long one at that.

Watching UC Davis campus police pepper-spraying a line of seated student protesters, the immediate and valid reaction is: What part of nonviolent do these officers not understand? Even if the last major waves of campus protests were a couple of decades ago, quelling student demonstrations without harm and with a minimum of residual outrage should be at the top of university training programs for police staff. VIDEO: UC Davis campus police pepper-sprays a line of seated student protesters A widely viewed video shows one officer walking along the line of students at an Occupy Davis encampment Friday, spraying them at close range as they bend their heads but otherwise remain still.

Two UC Davis campus police officers have been placed on paid administrative leave over their controversial use of pepper spray on student protesters, university officials announced Sunday as the UC system president said he was "appalled" by the incident and promised a review of police procedures at all campuses. Mark G. Yudof, the UC system president, said he would be talking to the 10 campus chancellors, as well as experts and other campus groups, "to conduct a thorough, far-reaching and urgent assessment of campus police procedures involving use of force, including post-incident review processes.

As outrage mounted over police use of pepper spray on nonviolent student demonstrators at UC Davis, the campus' embattled chancellor apologized for the incident and placed the university's police chief on administrative leave. During a tense speech Monday before more than 1,000 students and faculty members on the normally quiet Central Valley campus' main quad, Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi tried to quell criticism over the incident, as well as how university officials handled the aftermath.

As some faculty members called for her ouster, the chancellor of UC Davis launched an inquiry Saturday into the pepper-spraying of apparently peaceful Occupy Davis protesters by campus police. A video of the Friday incident that went viral on the Web showed a police officer dousing the protesters with a canister of pepper spray as they sat huddled on the ground. The police had been attempting to clear the university's Quad of tents and campers. Faculty and students reacted with outrage.

UC San Diego faced a losing battle recently when it tried to hang on to three star scientists being wooed by Rice University for cutting-edge cancer research. The recruiting package from the private Houston university included 40% pay raises, new labs and a healthy flow of research money from a Texas state bond fund. Another factor, unrelated to Rice, helped close the deal: The professors' sense that declining state funding for the University of California makes it a good time to pack their bags.

The food fight over the purity of extra virgin olive oil has boiled up again. The UC Davis Olive Center and the Australian Oils Research Laboratory released on Wednesday a second research report that found nearly three-quarters of the samples they tested of top-selling imported olive oil brands failed international extra virgin standards. The report follows a similar study the two research centers conducted last summer, which slammed imported olive oils and said that two-thirds of common brands of extra-virgin olive oil found in California grocery stores aren't what they claim to be. Wednesday's report, entitled "Evaluation of Extra-Virgin Olive Oil Sold in California," drew a larger group of samples from fewer brands ?