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Thursday, May 30, 1996

Democratic senator predicts tough road until final approvalBy Michael Howerton

Daily Bruin Staff

Gov. Pete Wilson is expected to officially announce the nomination of two new members to the University of California Board of Regents tomorrow.

Although both Gerald Parsky and Peter Preuss will have to be approved by the Senate Rules Committee, they will become board members as soon as the official announcement is made.

They will remain members of the board until the Senate decides to confirm or reject their nominations, which will be sometime within a year.

Parsky, 53, is a Republican and a chairman of a Los Angeles-based investment firm, Aurora Capital Partners. He was an assistant secretary in the U.S. Treasury Department from 1974 to 1977.

Parsky has been involved in the University of California since 1992 when he became a trustee of the UC San Diego Foundation.

Peter Preuss, 53, founded the Preuss Foundation, a brain tumor research firm, in 1985. He received his masters degree in math at UC San Diego in 1968 and has been involved in the campus as a teaching assistant in the 1960s and currently as a member of the Board of Overseers.

Both have revealed that they support Wilson's attempts to eliminate preferences based on gender or race in the university. Reports have also come to light that both are significant contributors to Wilson's campaigns.

Reports that Wilson has received donations of $74,000 from Parsky and $32,000 from Preuss might become issues of contention as the senate has vowed to put an end to the tradition of regental positions as rewards for the governor's allies.

Only once in the university's history has a governor's nominee ever been rejected by the senate committee. The confirmation process has largely been considered a mere formality by state officials.

But this time around things are going to be different, vowed a spokesman of Democratic Sen. Bill Lockyer, chair of the Senate Rules Committee, which votes to confirm or reject the nominations. The senate committee is taking a tougher stance in approving regents because of the numerous recent battles over university policies.

Critics have repeatedly charged that the regents have forsaken their obligation to the university by turning the board into a political arena ­ at times resembling a platform or a battlefield, seldom a regental body.

Over the past year, the board has also come under attack for becoming increasingly politicized in its decisions. Every one of the 16 appointed Board of Regents members are Republican and critics charge that this engenders a politicized atmosphere where the regents can pursue a program to complement the political aims of the Republican governor.

Many have speculated that the decision to eliminate affirmative action from the university last July was politically motivated to aid Wilson's attempts to launch a presidential campaign. Recently, the California Civil Rights Initiative (CCRI) has crept into the discussion at board meetings,as well.

Regent Ward Connerly, who spearheaded the drive to eliminate affirmative action, is also one of the main supporting forces behind Wilson's attempt to get CCRI passed by California voters. The initiative would eliminate all preferences due to race or gender in public institutions.

For many, Connerly is the epitome of the politicalization of the board. Other board members have reproached him during their monthly open meetings for dragging the board into the political waters.

At the March meeting in San Francisco, Regent William Bagley told Connerly that he resented Connerly's attempts to use his position as a regent to campaign for CCRI. Connerly's actions were destroying the integrity of the board, Bagley told him.

Connerly responded that the Board of Regents was political by nature and any beliefs that the board's actions were divorced from the political sphere were dillusions.

Lockyer however, disagrees and has vowed to prevent the trend of turning the University of California into a flag in the political winds. Parsky and Preuss will be examined with greater severity than any previous nominees, Lockyer's press secretary, Sandy Harrison said.

"(They) will be put under close scrutiny on a close array of issues," Harrison said. "Especially on student fees there will be very, very, close scrutiny."

Along with student fees, Harrison said Parsky and Preuss will be closely questioned on other controversial issues that have dominated the board's discussions this year.

While Harrison said he wouldn't consider the issues of affirmative action and admissions policies a litmus test for the nominees, he said, they will be central to the senate's examination.

"(They) will certainly be asked about their beliefs of diversity and will certainly be asked to defend their views," he said.

A spokesman for Republican Sen. Rob Beverly, also a member of the Rules Committee, agreed that the battle the nominees face will be tougher than usual.

"(The nominations) are going to be controversial," Beverly's administrative assistant, Tom Martin said. "There are lots of issues that the nominees are going to have to discuss and should expect to be questioned on."

Beverly will most likely support Wilson and vote in favor of confirming the two nominees, Martin said.

Despite the rigorous scrutiny the senate promises to apply, Martin speculated the past will probably serve as an accurate predictor of Parsky's and Preuss' fates.

"If you go with the track record," he said, "I would guess that the process would favor confirmation."

There have been two vacancies on the board since Regent Glenn Campbell and Regent Dean Watkins ended their 12-year terms in March. Watkins and Campbell were regarded as two of the most conservative regents on the board and both backed Wilson's plan to eliminate affirmative action in the university.