The Proposed Elimination of Prime Farmland at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo
And CAFES wants to celebrate.
125th Anniversary of Cal Poly’s College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences (CAFES)
Many students, parents and alumni are choosing not to attend and not to donate until this issue has an acceptable resolution. If you’ve already paid for tickets or donated, you can ask for your money back.
Sign the petition to Save Cal Poly SLO Farmland.
5,400+ signatures
Update: November 4, 2026
Armstrong released a new statement explaining why he plans to build on prime farmland. Read the full statement here.
One interesting reveal is this:
“Cal Poly worked closely with the County of San Luis Obispo, the submitting agency, to secure Opportunity Zone 2.0 designation for a portion of its campus. This federal designation is intended to stimulate investment in designated areas by providing tax incentives for qualifying long-term, private capital investments, potentially supporting future campus development, research and innovation partnerships, and economic growth.”
Shame on the county. If the county was the submitting agency, does the board of supervisors approve of this building plan? Or is it the Chief Operating Officer, Matt Pontes?
The fight is not over.
There a number of environmental attorneys reviewing this situation.
EIRs require strong justifications for building on prime farmland. It must be proven that the proposed development cannot happen anywhere else and that equal land is available (spoiler - it isn’t).
Update: October 26, 2026
Ag Alert Op-Ed from a Cal Poly Alum, Danilu Jelderks
More work to be done
August 2026: Armstrong said that approximately 30 acres of Prime farmland - the newly planted fruit and nut orchard, the organic farming research field (aka organic sandbox), and the lemon orchard, were being considered for development of his “bustling neighborhood” on campus.
Oct. 22: Armstrong sent an email to CAFES to say he is not currently considering the lemon orchard for development, but he still wants to build on approximately 18 acres of Prime farmland - the new fruit and nut orchard and the organic sandbox.
Is this a concession or a compromise or a win? No, absolutely not. Any loss of prime farmland on campus is unacceptable.
Armstrong agreed to the Master Plan 2035, published in June 2019, which protects Class I (=Prime) farm land on campus from future development. He is now ignoring this agreement and wants to destroy 18 acres instead of honoring the agreement. This is not a compromise or a win. The loss of 18 acres of Prime farmland that is a finite natural resource, actively being used to teach and train students and conduct much needed research is a major loss to Cal Poly and to the State of California.
Our efforts are having an impact
Armstrong and CAFES Dean, Brian Horgan, have had to meet publicly with various groups to explain their intentions. These conversations have revealed the absence of a well thought out plan, along with missteps and contradictory statements about their intentions. Case in point, the Farm Store.
The Farm Store has donor funding support and was initially to be part of renovating the Crops Unit building at the corner of Highland Ave and Mt. Bishop Drive. Armstrong determined that the costs for renovation were too high and that the store building needed to be relocated. That job fell to Dean Brian Horgan who decided, without any open discussions, that the store could be built on part of the new student teaching orchard. And in an earlier email to faculty and staff, he asked for ideas on additional activities that could occur on the remaining orchard parcel. Aside from the hypocrisy and logistical complications, Armstrong and Horgan have recently emailed the whole of CAFES to report that the farm store will now be located “adjacent to existing college facilities including the Center for Wine and Viticulture”.
The unified pushback from students, alumni, faculty, staff and community played a part in their new decision, and it is a small win. The location of the CAFES farm store is now slated to be built between the Wine and Viticulture Center and the Crops Unit, on land that is only suitable for building.
The link between Year-Round Operation (YRO) and the farmland.
There is a link between the ag fields building proposal and Armstrong’s plan to push Cal Poly into year-round operation (YRO).
More information about YRO:
From the Office of the President
Armstrong has publicly stated that YRO is vital to the success of Cal Poly and that building on the west campus farmland is vital to the success of YRO. The controversial YRO plan is currently tenuous at best and his statements reveal that he is pursuing YRO without the facilities to support it.
Since there are other areas on campus better suited to the buildings being proposed, how will Armstrong adequately justify the need for building on prime farmland along Highland Ave? He will eventually have to make this justification because a new Environmental Impact Report will be required, and one of the stipulations for building on Prime farmland in California is successfully making a case that no other options are available and that the building is absolutely necessary at that location.
The land swap
Dean Brian Horgan emailed faculty, staff and students and provided some details about the manure spray fields that Armstrong is offering as a concession. He stated, “Faculty have collected soil samples and submitted them for lab analysis, and we are awaiting those results to better understand the land’s agricultural potential and the improvements that may be necessary to support future teaching and research activities.”
This means that some testing has begun but data are not yet available. This is only part of the testing needed to determine whether or not the manure spray field can be rehabilitated to safely grow food crops.
However, it's interesting that the University’s West Campus portal states that the manure spray field is not suitable for their buildings. Not suitable for buildings, but they want us to accept without data, that these damaged fields are an equal trade for the productive fields currently in use? Absolutely not.
At this point, neither Horgan nor Armstrong cannot in good faith make the claim that the manure spray fields will work as replacement land because they simply do not know. And if the spray field cannot be rehabilitated, then Armstrong will be in a bind without alternative sites.
Premature assumptions, the reactive nature of Armstrong’s and Horgan’s statements, and dismissing clear guidance from the Master Plan 2035, does not inspire confidence in those in leadership positions.
Wrap up
We will take a brief moment to give you all a pat on the back for the work you’ve done so far, it is helping! But we cannot stop here. The administration will continue to push their agenda, so we will continue to demand Armstrong honor the 2035 Master Plan and accept the guidance of the current EIR. No matter how he spins it, his current plan destroys 18 acres of Prime farmland and that is unacceptable.
There is more work to be done to protect productive farmland from development.
Any loss of Prime farmland is a loss for current and future students and for the state of California.
What can you do?
Let Dean Horgan know that you appreciate the change in location for the CAFES farm store, but that it’s not enough. Tell them that without a university commitment to not build on Prime farmland you will not attend the CAFES 125th celebration or make any donations.
Update: Oct 17, 2026
A joint statement from the SLO County Farm Bureau, The Cattlewomen and Cattlemen’s Associations of San Luis Obispo County was released on October 14 which details their strong opposition to the proposed west campus development. re
Update: Oct 6, 2026
AgCenter put out a very thorough article titled, Cal Poly Wants to Pave Our Class 1 Soil To Build a Hotel, Housing, and a Conference Center. Alumni Hold the Leverage to Stop It.
Update: Sept 27, 2026
Continued pushback from students, faculty, the ag industry and the community has resulted in a swirl of emails with contradictory statements and new spins on the same story from the Cal Poly administration.
Sept. 11: CAFES Dean, Brian Horgan emails CAFES faculty and staff regarding the location of the farm store:
The farm store was to be built on the already paved crops unit on Highland Ave
But it would “require significant infrastructure and remediation investments”
Instead they identified the current teaching orchard - prime farmland - as the best spot for the farm store
Sept. 22: in an email to faculty, staff and now students, the Dean says,
“It is important to me that you hear directly from college leadership about what we know, what remains under discussion and what we are doing to represent CAFES’ academic needs.”
But he left out all the information about removing the orchard to build a farm store.
Sept. 25: Cal Poly President Jeff Armstrong emails everyone on campus to announce their new commitment to transparency and justifications for his persistent interest in building on prime farmland. There is a new West Campus Web Portal that includes a portion of the previous 54-acre proposal.
Armstrong is now stating:
His desire to meet the basic needs of students and the community
Less acreage lost - approx. 30 acres
No significant development anticipated before 2030.
What does he consider significant?
And he again tries to justify his plan to build on prime farmland:
“Since early 2025, we have engaged students, faculty, staff, alumni, agricultural experts and other stakeholders about a potential project.”
2015: Armstrong proposed his building plan. Students, faculty, and the ag industry said no.
2025: Armstrong tried again. And again, students, faculty and the ag industry said no.
2026: 4,800+ signatures from students, parents, alumni, real ag professionals and the community still say no.
The new West Campus Portal does not offer a clear path for the public to provide input.
The message is clear and has not changed.
Don't build on farmland.
Any loss of prime farmland is a loss for Cal Poly and the state of CA.
125th Anniversary of Cal Poly’s College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences (CAFES)
Many students, parents and alumni are choosing not to attend and not to donate until this issue has an acceptable resolution. If you’ve already paid for tickets or donated, you can ask for your money back.
Update: Sept 23, 2026
Many concerned folks submitted public comments ahead of the CSU Board of Trustees meeting, Dean Brian Horgan sent an email to the students, faculty and staff with an update, and President Armstrong made a big announcement about a massive donation of land out by the SLO airport. More on that announcement coming soon.
Update: Sept. 13, 2026
The work continues.
Two impactful steps you can take:
A big celebration and fundraising campaign is planned for Cal Poly’s CAFES 125th anniversary.
Get the attention of Armstrong, the CAFES Dean's office, the department advisory councils and anyone else involved with planning or fundraising related to the 125th anniversary. Send emails, or message on LinkedIn:
any of the Plant Sciences Department advisory council members,
the CAFES’s advisory council members,
Dean Brian Horgan (bhorgan@calpoly.edu)
Jeff Armstrong (jarmstro@calpoly.edu)
Many students, parents and alumni are choosing not to attend and not to donate until this issue has an acceptable resolution. If you’ve already paid for tickets or donated, you can ask for your money back.
2. Contact the CSU Board of Trustees (Armstrong’s bosses)
Submit a 1-minute public comment in-person or online by September 21st
Public comment will take place on Tuesday, September 22, at the start of the Board of Trustees’ open session, scheduled to begin at approximately 11:00 a.m.
Email written comments in advance of the meeting by 12:00 p.m. on Monday, September 21 to trusteesoffice@calstate.edu.
Public comment during the meeting, in-person or virtually/telephonically by providing a written request by 12:00 p.m. on Monday, September 21 to trusteesoffice@calstate.edu or completing the form at Addressing the Board of Trustees. In your request, identify the subject of your comment - Do Not Build on Prime Farmland at Cal Poly, SLO.
The meeting will be broadcast via the livestream through the Board of Trustees website.
Here is the 1-minute comment I plan to submit. Feel free to use this one or write your own.
California loses 47,000 acres of farmland every year, approximately 1 square mile every 5 days on average. It is a problem for CA agriculture and CSU campuses that serve that industry should not be part of the problem. President Jeff Armstrong of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo wants to destroy 54 acres of prime farmland on campus, ignoring previous agreements that protected this land from development, to build a non-academic neighborhood on campus that no one has asked for. This severely weakens student’s expectations for a hands-on learning experience.
Instead - build on already compromised soils and seek innovation and educational opportunities from the design and build programs on campus.
Set the example for land and natural resource stewardship.
Honor your previous commitments and the wishes of the student body and do not build on prime farmland.
End of comment
The Clock Has Started Ticking
The administration is moving forward despite their claims that this is in the discussion phase, and that no decisions have yet been made.
A consultant group, hired by the university, accessed a recently planted orchard on the disputed land to begin looking for architectural or Native American presence of historical significance - one element required for an Environmental Impact Report for building permits.
The Dean’s office has decided, as of Sept. 11, 2026, that the first building to be built on our prime farmland is a farm store with additional structures and activities that would displace the remainder of the current orchard.
Potential Risks and an Impossible Timeline
Their current plan is to remove part of the new orchard, on prime farmland, to build a Cal Poly Farm Store starting in late September. As compensation, they want to simultaneously convert the dairy manure spray fields into a new orchard/crop field.
Their claim that the dairy manure spray fields could one day be used to farm crops for human consumption has no scientific evidence. These fields have been designated for the purposes of spraying manure effluent, and hosting the tractor pull, rodeo, and other events. To now grow crops on this soil, the following must first be assessed:
soil degradation by compaction and salts
soil and water contaminated by pathogens that cause foodborne illnesses
excessive nutrients such as nitrates and/or heavy metals
Catch-22
Gathering these data would take months, if not longer. The university president’s office has created a Catch-22. Armstrong has given the agriculture Dean’s office a deadline of the end of this September to provide a cost estimate for making the spray fields suitable for an orchard and other crops. The information needed to determine if the land can be made safe and productive for food crop production cannot be collected in time.
There is a strong likelihood of soil pollutants in the fields, and it could take years if not decades to remediate those soils. Options for remediation of the soil include leaching contaminants, which may contaminate the water table or nearby Brizzolara Creek, a designated sensitive habitat for endangered and sensitive salmonid species.
Additionally, because the university will begin building right away, hundreds of current students won’t have access to the land needed for their educational laboratories. Students and faculty would have to wait years while an attempt is made to rehabilitate the land and establish a new multi-crop deciduous orchard for teaching, an organic farming research plot, and a lemon orchard large enough to teach students industry-scale skills and conduct industry-focused research projects. Most of these academic activities may not even be possible, therefore, current and future students will not be getting the degree they signed up for and paying steep tuition to receive.
Neither faculty nor students have asked for a farm store. Cal Poly products are already sold by students at local farmers markets and grocery stores throughout the community.
Here’s the kicker. Instead of building it on an empty parking lot across the street, they want to bulldoze a newly planted orchard – part of the 54 acres of prime farmland. The administration is framing this farm store as “agriculture”, which is how they rationalize building on prime farmland.
There is no clear cost savings for building the farm store on prime farmland instead of on an already paved or compacted area, nor has university administration articulated a justification for doing so. Where’s the transparency?
The Dairy Unit
And what is the dairy supposed to do with up to one million gallons of manure effluent they produce in a year? The animal science department and agricultural operations - the faculty and staff who utilize the spray fields - don’t know where the effluent will go. If an alternate location is suggested by the administration, it cannot be assumed that it will be appropriate, safe or that it won’t negatively impact yet another educational program.
The university does not have a plan for what they are eliminating from student curriculum and department operations. They want to get started, build on prime farmland, all without having to answer any questions or explain their rationale.
This statement from a colleague, who wishes to remain anonymous, clearly articulates the frustration:
"I was sad to see the Dean’s email [about the decision to build the farm store on Prime Farmland] this morning. If the college continues building on our farmland, how can we expect anyone to take us seriously when... we need to preserve it to deliver the educational mission.... It feels like the college and university just want to build without any strategic vision or plan, let alone faculty, student and staff input."
Why is Armstrong hiding?
The administration has not responded to face-to-face meeting requests from a group concerned about the proposal to build on prime farmland on Cal Poly SLOs campus.
Cal Poly officials have not held any public meetings or made any public announcements about the building proposal.
Keep calling. Keep emailing. Keep asking for a public meeting to ask questions and hear directly from the proponents of this plan.
Our message is clear. Do not build on prime farmland.
Update: Aug 29, 2026
To date, the petition has acquired 3,000+ signatures and a network of key partners is growing.
The University has developed a standard reply for all inquiries. One claim is that they have done due diligence by engaging all the important stakeholders, and that has directly informed their planning. They say “protecting and strengthening the educational experience of our agriculture students has been a guiding principle throughout this process.”
Who are the important stakeholders? Students or faculty or alumni? The University has not disclosed who exactly they met with or what the feedback was.
What we do know is that they have not consulted with the faculty directly involved in maintaining and teaching on these lands. We also know the University had a meeting with agriculture students in 2025. As a result, the students published a resolution adamantly against building on agriculture lands on campus. Read the ASI resolution #25-07.
So again, who does the University consider to be an “important stakeholder”? Clearly not students if the University is ignoring the resolution.
And how does the elimination of productive orchards on prime farmland protect and strengthen the education experience of our agriculture students? There is deception and flawed reasoning on their part.
Update: Aug 21, 2026
The Tribune published their article today, which was very well done. One of Cal Poly’s consistent talking points is “no net loss” of farmland for agriculture students. The problem is that they are focusing on the quantity of land, but the crucial issue is the quality of land. They are proposing to build on Prime farmland in exchange for land that is only suitable for grazing - land that will not support vegetable crops or fruit orchards that students and faculty use for teaching and research. Non-academic facilities like a hotel, convention center and retail space are not living laboratories and would not preserve or enhance agricultural education. This is a key point that bears repeating.
Update: Aug 15, 2026:
We are encouraged by the overwhelming response from students, parents, alum and the community at large. Many are writing letters, contacting the media, local representatives and leaders in the ag industry are organizing.
If you’re ready to help, here’s what you can do.
Write letters, call or email:
President Jeff Armstrong, jarmstro@calpoly.edu
Brian Horgan, bhorgan@calpoly.edu, the Dean of the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences
Tell them to:
Honor the agreement in the Master Plan 2035 that exempts this land from development.
Stop ignoring student resolution #25-07 that formally opposed any development on ag lands.
The proposed “land swap” is insulting. Swapping Prime productive farmland for land that is only suitable for grazing is not an option. We know the difference and we will not be misled.
Non-academic facilities like a hotel, convention center and retail space are not living laboratories and would not preserve or enhance agricultural education. So who exactly would benefit from this?
You can focus your message on any of these talking points that resonate with you the most. Or you can add your own.
Contact your local representatives. Ask them to take action to preserve this non-renewable resource at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.
Original Post, August 10, 2026
The US loses nearly a square mile of farmland every day (Conservation Fund 2025). Sometimes these losses occur when farming families have little to no choice. But in the case of Cal Poly, the proposal to eliminate productive agricultural land and lease it to a developer for a hotel and retail space is a choice that has left me dumbfounded, yet again. This is the second time the administration has made such a proposal. The first time in 2015 was supposed to be the last.
Family Farms
Drive up Hwy 101 towards the Bay Area and you’ll pass through some of the most fertile and productive agricultural lands in the world. Yes, the world. The agricultural output of this stretch of land dwarfs the entire output of most US states and of entire nations. It should be a treasured resource. But it is under threat. Along that 101 drive you can see massive structures being built on prime agricultural land. In the Salinas Valley, there’s an Amazon distribution warehouse, and another proposed for Gilroy. Giving up farmland must be difficult for families and businesses. I can only speculate that some reduction is necessary, oftentimes there’s no one else in the family to farm the land, kids move away, retirements, deaths; sometimes it’s a business decision. Land that has been in families for generations, now being paved over is a painful sight for all involved in agriculture, big and small. Once you build on it, you never get it back.
The Proposal
The loss of agricultural land could be happening here right on my home campus of Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, but for very different reasons. The university’s administration is proposing to build on what is designated as Prime or Class 1 farmland; thereby, eliminating a rare resource used to teach students how to become responsible and innovative leaders in all aspects of agriculture in California and beyond. The heart of our learn-by-doing approach…gone.
Cal Poly’s Master Plan 2035 is intended to guide land development on campus through 2035. By the time it and the environmental impact report were finalized in 2020, new builds on campus were to be concentrated in the campus core and avoid negatively impacting other natural resources. Specifically, 250 acres of Prime farmland that were explicitly excluded from further development.
Apricot trees planted by students, staff and faculty in 2022.
Cal Poly President Jeff Armstrong’s current vision does not honor the Master Plan 2035. Instead, he wants to lease this land to an off-campus developer to build a hotel, restaurants, senior living space, mixed use residential areas, a theater, etc. Basically, this is a way to create more revenue for the university. A direct quote from the proposal states “The site’s current role as a living classroom - home to lemon groves and active fields - is not just history, but an opportunity to create a bustling neighborhood, interwoven with industry partnerships and activation.” They literally are saying our living classrooms are history. They want to replace student learn-by-doing spaces with a “bustling neighborhood”. They want to pave over the fields Cal Poly’s reputation was founded on.
Cal Poly Agricultural Lands
Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, has 280 acres of Prime farmland. About 200 of which is rangeland for grazing livestock. There are approximately 83 acres of agricultural and horticultural fields and over an acre of greenhouse spaces. These lands are right on campus and easily accessible for students and staff from the campus core and classrooms.
Modified map from Cal Poly Working Lands Mapping Project Documentation showing Cal Poly’s 280 acres of prime agricultural lands, with key crops and activities adjacent to the campus core and easy access for students.
What is so special about this land? The map below shows the Highland Avenue entrance to the west side of campus off of Hwy 1/Santa Rosa St. Entering campus, you pass by 54 acres of Prime farmland that includes a 10-acre lemon orchard, row crop fields, and a new deciduous orchard that has fruit and nut varieties suitable for coastal climates. The administration’s proposal puts buildings and parking lots on these lands.
The Highland Avenue entrance to the west side of campus off of Hwy 1/Santa Rosa St. The white dotted line outlines the Class 1 Prime farmland.
Building on Prime Farmland
The area (outlined with a white dotted line above and in red below) is designated as Prime farmland. The map below is from Cal Poly’s Master Plan 2035. The legend is clear, P stands for Prime or Class 1 farmland. Other nearby fields are designated as Farmland of Statewide Importance, or Unique Farmland, or Farmland of Local Potential. Armstrong and the Cal Poly administration are well aware of these designations, but do not appreciate how critical a resource these lands are locally and statewide.
A map from Cal Poly’s Master Plan 2035. The added red dotted line outlines the Prime farmland that the Cal Poly administration is proposing to lease for urban development.
When I heard about this proposal, I had to speak up. I have a vested interest in the success of the Plant Sciences department and not just because I worked there for nearly 30 years. I’ve participated in and observed the learning that happens in our fields and orchards. Companies hire Cal Poly graduates because of the experiences they gain working in these living laboratories. And as a human who likes to eat, I have a personal interest in keeping all Prime farmland in production and not paved over with asphalt.
Soil Designations
Note: If you want to skip the details (not recommended), scroll down to the What Can You Do section below.
The terms soil, topsoil, arable land, and prime agricultural land are not just nouns. Prime or Class 1 farmland are not just a catchy descriptions. They are actual classifications of a non-renewable resource. They are specific definitions used to categorize land that in turn helps us determine how best to care for it.
I use the deductive method - moving from general to specific - as an organizing framework in my teaching. So here we go...
Earth
We’re on Earth. Its outer shell is the crust made up of rock ranging from 3 to 44 miles in thickness. The crust is thin. It represents less than one percent of the planet's radius.
Soil
The outermost layer of the crust is mostly covered with soil - the superficial unconsolidated and usually weathered outermost part of the crust or lithosphere of a planet.
On Earth specifically, soil is the surface layer where plants can grow. Soil averages 5 to 10 inches deep; in some places it can be 20 to 40 inches deep. This means soil is 0.0004% to 0.0001% of the crust’s overall thickness. All terrestrial life on this planet depends on a whisper thin skin of soil 10 inches thick.
Topsoil
Topsoil is a term that puts an anthropocentric spin on soil beyond simply just being. Topsoil is the surface soil including the organic layer in which plants have most of their roots and which is turned over in plowing.
As a term, topsoil changes the focus. Soil goes from a benign end product of planetary weathering that provides a resource in which plants grow on their own to a resource where we conduct food growing activities for our benefit.
Arable Land, a Non-Renewable Resource
Not all soil is suitable for growing plants, and not all topsoil is suitable for growing food, hence the next term: arable. Arable land is fit for and used for growing crops.
Needless to say, there’s not a lot of soil available for growing food and we often hear about the constant loss of arable land. The US loses nearly a square mile of farmland every day (Conservation Fund 2025). Another source puts it this way: Since the 1996 Farm Bill changed what growers decide to grow (seminal change in US farm policy), land in US farms has declined by 74.7 million acres or -8%. By far, pastureland declined the most, accounting for 88% of the total decline. The other two major farmland categories have also declined: woodlands by -6% and cropland by -2%. (Farm Doc Daily 2024). Another perspective: in the 5 year period between 2017 and 2022, the US lost, or farming ceased, on 20.1 million acres, an area equal to the size of Maine (American Farm Bureau Federation 2024). This isn’t just a US problem. Globally, the world has lost one-third (33%) of farmable (=arable) land since 1975 (Science Alert 2015).
It takes 1,000 years of natural processes to make 1 inch of topsoil (Scientific American 2014). So yes, arable land qualifies as a non-renewable resource.
Prime, Class 1 Farmland
The lemon orchard has taught thousands of students about citrus production and pest management methods. Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, 2026.
Not all arable lands are equal. Some are better than others.
In the U.S., agricultural lands are classified based on their use such as farming or ranching or even timber production. Specific regulations vary by state. In California, agricultural lands are classified based on a grading system of 1, 2, 3a, 3b, 4 and 5. Grades 1 and 2 receive the most planning protections and 3a land is considered as “best and most versatile” (BMV) land and also has planning protections.
The best of the best is Class 1 or Prime farmland and has the strongest state and local agency planning protections. Meaning, building on such soil – a rare, non-renewable and widely beneficial resource – is guarded against and in some cases prohibited. There are restrictions in place to protect these resources, such as:
Under CEQA, converting Prime farmland to non-agricultural uses triggers rigorous environmental review, and local agencies are intensely discouraged or legally challenged if they approve projects that destroy Prime farmland without major overriding public benefits and mandatory mitigation.
At Cal Poly, the Prime farmland designation is amplified by the fact that these fields are our laboratories for hands-on, learn-by-doing teaching, just as a chemistry lab, engineering lab, design studio, or theater are. All are cornerstones of a polytechnic university and Cal Poly’s learn-by-doing motto.
Would Cal Poly’s administration walk into a chemistry lab and say, hey, let’s turn this into a Starbuck’s for the town folk? No, that would be ridiculous and obviously antithetical to Cal Poly’s mission.
Also, teaching labs at California State Universities are officially categorized and designated by the state and the California State University system as “formal instructional and capacity space”. The state tracks physical facilities using formal space standards originally tied to the Coordinating Council for Higher Education, separating academic space into specific designations like lecture rooms, faculty offices, and teaching laboratories. Further, teaching laboratories are bound by specific state-level utilization formulas (measuring weekly student contact hours and station occupancy) to justify capital outlay and state funding.
Let’s Measure Some Student Contact Hours, Shall We?
Students, staff and faculty walk from the campus core and within 10 minutes they are working and learning and experimenting in the fields that grow many of California’s most important crops. I walked my students out there nearly every week for every class I taught for 29 years. Four different courses, some multiple times per year, averaging 40 to 50 students per course. That’s 6,670 students and ~70,000 weekly student contact hours of instruction in our agricultural fields over the course of my career. That’s just one professor providing learning experiences not available at any other four-year university campus in California. The diversity of crops and breadth of learning is unmatched across the US. And There are more than a dozen faculty that constantly use those fields for teaching. This equates to hundreds of thousands of accumulated student hours of unique learning and honing valuable skills.
Those skills are crucial to student success. They research, and experiment and make mistakes during the process, which is where the most important learning takes place. They gain experience that puts them head and shoulders above graduates from other campuses. That is a defensible definition of student success.
Round 2
This is not the first time we've had to protect our farmland. President Armstrong made a similar proposal in 2015, and the response was swift. Students mobilized, fought back and won. The university administration agreed not to build on the agricultural lands and to find other ways to satisfy the university’s need for buildings in the future. There is an existing signed document - the Master Plan 2035, but Armstrong is ignoring that agreement.
Cal Poly’s mission is to teach, not to make money off of leases and eliminate one of our most precious resources, a resource that is under duress all over California. We should be the example of how to conserve such a resource, not the example of how to forsake it.
It’s time to organize and put a stop to this, again. The faculty definitely have a dog in this fight, but the administration doesn’t listen to our protests because they believe they have a better understanding of student needs. We were successful last time because students, alumni, the community, concerned leaders in agriculture, The Farm Bureau, the planning commission and others rallied together as one voice and said no to Armstrong. We need that same level of outside organization and support again. It’s going to take a few folks willing to get together, make some calls, set up an organizational structure and develop a plan. Who will be a champion for Cal Poly and for agriculture? Are you ready?
We have to protect California’s farmland and stop the loss of Class 1 Prime acreage essential for training the next generation of food producers. Period. Tell Armstrong and the Cal Poly administration NO! Tell them to keep their hands off our teaching lands. Tell them to honor their previous promise not to build on a precious natural resource.
Steps you can take:
Spread the word amongst your network to get this message out to as many people as possible
Write your representatives: Rep. Salud Carbajal; Sen. John Laird; Supervisor Bruce Gibson; and Supervisor Heather Moreno. Tell them about this situation and that it needs to be stopped.
Write to Jeff Armstrong (jarmstro@calpoly.edu) and Brian Horgan (bhorgan@calpoly.edu) the Dean of the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences. Tell them to honor their previous commitment. Tell them you want rare agricultural soils preserved in perpetuity. And tell them agricultural learn-by-doing requires large fields in active crop production to ensure competency for future generations of highly qualified food producers in this state.
And lastly, if you’re willing to step up and take a leadership role, email me at info@californiainsectscience.com. The time is now.
Sources
Conservation Fund - 4 Surprising Statistics Reveal What’s Really Happening to America’s Lands
Farm Bureau Intel - Over 140,000 Farms Lost in 5 Years
Science Alert - The World Has Lost a Third of Its Farmable Land in The Last 40 Years
Scientific American - Only 60 Years of Farming Left If Soil Degradation Continues
Cabbage grown on campus, Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.