Special Report: UCR Palm Desert

Great fanfare surrounded the opening of a Palm Desert campus of University of California Riverside on April 15, 2005. The city donated 8.5 acres of land off Cook Street and Frank Sinatra, and loaned the U.C. system $3 million toward the creation of a graduate school with a focus on entrepreneurial studies.

Business mogul and part-owner of the Phoenix Suns, Richard Heckmann even forked over $6 million to help fund it. But eight years later, the campus is hardly bustling on a school day. Since 2006, only 131 people have earned a degree.

Current Program at UCR Palm Desert

“The Coachella Valley itself just couldn’t sustain the kind of graduate school we wanted to have here,” says Tod Goldberg. He runs the only course of study currently offered at UCR Palm Desert, an online, or “low residency” Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing.

Twice a year, students from the Creative Writing program come in from all over the world to the Rancho Las Palmas Resort in Rancho Mirage to attend classes. That is also where the commencement ceremony is held. In theory, students could get a degree at UCR Palm Desert, and never once set foot on campus.

U.S. Congressman Mark Takano is an alum, and many students are successful, says Goldberg. “Over 75 percent have published or produced.”

And Goldberg says the $40,000 tuition for an MFA doesn’t use any taxpayer money.

“The fact that we are self-supporting– that we pay our literal light bill with the money that we earn strictly from the students, not the taxpayers– answers a very simple question that there is a desire for this kind of university, and a desire for this kind of graduate school, and the students that want to take it,” he says.

“So the students don’t live here because they live all around the world,” adds Goldberg. “And they don’t stay on campus because we have to, when they come here, house them and feed them also. So it makes sense to have them take their classes online.”

UCR Palm Desert handed out only 22 MBA’s before its centerpiece program went dark. Executive Director Tamara Hedges says the campus became a victim of the economy.

“We’ve hit the reset button and we’re working with a lot of other partners, including the city of Palm Desert, to determine what’s the best fit for our community here,” she says.

“When we opened the campus in 2005, we had two graduate degree programs,” Hedges says. “We had an MBA program, which morphed into a very successful executive MBA program, and now it’s no longer here at UCR.”

Making Use of the Campus

So what actually happens on campus? A couple of nonprofits have set up shop, including the Clinton Health Matters Initiative, and HARC. Movies get screened, art exhibited, lectures held and environmental conservation research is conducted. An oasis was built out back with grant money. “There’s an endangered fish here called the desert pupfish, that is federally and state endangered,” offers Cameron Barrows, Ph.D., a research associate for the Desert Studies Initiative.

“The university has two main missions,” says Barrows. “One is teaching, the other is research. I represent the research end of our mission here.”

The school’s website prominently advertises the nearly new, yet very empty classrooms and lecture halls available for rent. UCR holds extension classes there a couple times a week.

But ask Palm Desert City Manager John Wohlmuth, if the campus has been a disappointment, and he says “yes.”

Despite the disappointment, the city of Palm Desert is essentially doubling down its investment in UC Riverside’s Coachella Valley campus. Just recently, the City Council green-lit the gift of another 11.5 acres adjacent to the existing two buildings. Land that, in total, cost the city’s redevelopment agency about $11 million to acquire.

“There is perhaps a leap of faith here,” says Wohlmuth.

New Medical School Campus

The latest idea at UCR Palm Desert, is to use the new land to build a place for aspiring physicians to learn, perform research, and provide public outreach.

Dr. G. Richard Olds, dean of UC Riverside’s School of Medicine explains, “What we’re looking to do is build an ambulatory teaching facility that will both take care of patients, but also be an ideal environment to teach healthcare professionals how to take care of patients in outpatient settings.”

Olds says a new medical campus will also help fill the void of primary and general care doctors in the valley.

But Olds admits while the School of Medicine now as the land, there’s no funding. “And we still have to have an integrated plan,” he adds.

As part of the land deal, UC Riverside promised to better utilize UCR’s existing two buildings and build another bigger one.

“Lease the building back from the developer,” explains Wohlmuth. “That’s their current plan, so they don’t have the upfront cost to develop a $20-30 million building.”

Benefactor on Board?

“They can use the existing auditorium to do continuing medical education right there on campus,” says Wohlmuth. “And that was a big selling point to the council as well.”

“Now I’m all in favor of seeing 50 buildings down there,” says Richard Heckmann. “I’m all in favor of seeing a fabulous campus. But there’s not much we’ve seen so far to indicate it’s going to work.”

As the major benefactor of the Coachella Valley campus, Heckmann is arguable more invested in the success of UC Riverside Palm Desert than anyone else. Even taxpayers. And does he call it a success?

“I think for the amount of money that was put in there, and for the hopes that we had for what it would accomplish. No.”

Heckmann’s seen five chancellors, and many more business school heads come and go since he bought in to the concept of a graduate school in the Coachella Valley, and he’s not sold on the new plans.

“I think they’re in a hurry to build another building because no one has said no,” says Heckmann. “Nobody has said, hey wait a minute. Taxpayers are in this for $20 million. Maybe we should figure out how to get them a return before we build another building.

That’s where Heckmann believes the city of Palm Desert can play a big part.

“I think as a city, we’ve done everything possible to make UCR a part of the community,” says Wohlmuth. “It’s a big economic development tool for us.”

And for that reason, economic potential, Heckman believes there’s life left in that campus yet.

“Generally, good ideas are hard to kill. And that’s a good idea. And somebody’s going to come along here and make it work.”

Update:

City Council member Jan Harnik sits on the university oversight committee. She says about two months ago, the committee started meeting again, and plans to put together a meeting with the city manager, Heckmann, and Olds to talk about the issues surrounding what happened.

“We are disappointed with had happened, but a lot of things fell apart because of the economy,” Harnik says. And she’s encouraged by the way UCR is marketing the medical school. “The goal is to train aspiring physicians in our area and keep them in the area.”