This is the expanded version of an article published in partnership with Berkeleyside, a nonprofit digital news platform in Berkeley. Read Area 6 Trustee Dyana Delfín Polk’s Q&A here, and read a shortened version of both interviews here.

Berkeley voters won’t see Nicky González Yuen on their ballots this year, but they might catch him biking by the Marina with his wife sometime. Yuen, a political science instructor at De Anza College, is running uncontested for his sixth term on the Peralta Community College District’s governing board.

The four-college district enrolls over 20,000 students. Yuen, who represents Area 4, will serve on the board during an era of new leadership as the district grapples with budget cuts, aging facilities, and discontent around campus safety.

The board’s seven trustees are tasked with overseeing the district’s finances, monitoring its performance, and hiring its chancellor. The district’s newest chancellor, Tammeil Gilkerson, stepped into her role in January. She’s the district’s fifth chancellor since 2019.

The Citizen sat down with Yuen in their newsroom at Laney College. Here’s how the conversation went.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

The Citizen: You’ve been on this board for 20 years. Why would you like to continue to serve for another four?

Yuen: Things are actually just getting fun. We’re at a critical point right now where we’ve made a transition to a phenomenal administration. We’re lined up to make changes that we haven’t been able to make before, and I don’t want to miss this.

I’ve worked really hard to get us right here, and I think if we can make Peralta really work well, then it will be a model that we can take out to other places in the state. There are a lot of things broken in the community college system. The challenges are often that, like at Peralta, have often been that people are working in silos and often can’t see each other’s struggles. And then also it’s just culturally been set up that people fight with each other.

We are finally not doing that. When we went out to hire the chancellor position, my number one criterion was, could we find somebody who was a team builder, somebody who really understood at a real gut level that we all do better when we all do better, that we’re not going to do well when we’re fighting and distracted. We found such a person who also has a lot of other skills. But you know, first and foremost, I think that what we have right now is the possibility of making systemic changes where everybody’s buying in.

I don’t think that we’re going to get it all right the first time. I think that the underlying problems are really, really difficult. But I think what we’ve got right now is the possibility of people saying, “All right, look, we put ideas on the table, let’s see what the best ones seem to be. Let’s go with that. And if that doesn’t work, we all agreed to go along with it. So let’s now all agree to look at it and say, ‘Where did we mess up? Where could we improve and what’s working well? Where can we replicate that?’”

I’m having a lot of fun right now. And I don’t know if you watch board meetings, but yesterday’s board meeting was really good. We had an equity report that I think was the best equity report, EEO report, anti-racist report that we’ve ever had, anti-discrimination, report that we’ve ever had. You could just see the tone in the room was very different than in past years, where people would be pointing fingers and being suspicious or just bored, and that’s not happening anymore.

Name three things you want to see happen at the district during your term.

One of them is about to start happening. They’re about to roll out a new model of a shared governance process. California is very unusual in that we have this massive public college system, biggest in the world, that’s locally governed. And then beyond that, there are mandates to include the voices of students, of classified workers and of faculty. You have people like me who represent the community. We are the voice of the community. The board is the voice of the community. I think in many districts throughout the state, and previously, at Peralta, the mandates of AB 1725, the shared governance mandates were pretty much ignored, given lip service to.

I think right now we’ve got this process going on where there’s buy-in on how we’re going to solve problems. So one, if we can model out a strong shared governance process, I think that’s the foundation for solving a lot of other problems. And so I’m excited about that. It’s going to take some tinkering. We’re going to have to figure that out.

We need to figure out how to get a handle on the long term budgetary problems that we’ve had. We’re really operating at a deficit. It’s not like there’s tons of money lying around and people are wasting it. You hear sometimes, sort of a right wing critique of government is that there’s waste, fraud and abuse. Maybe there’s been some waste here. Certainly there’s been some inefficiencies. But I don’t think that’s the principal problem, and so getting a handle on the long term budgetary challenges, I think, is really critical.

Once we get those basic things under control, I really want to see us moving on affordable student housing. In the district where I work [Foothill De-Anza], we went to the public, asked for bond money. We had the public approve almost a billion dollars in bond money, $200 million of which is earmarked for affordable housing. We have a lot of land here. We have a lot of need. I think the public would support that. And so once we get the rest of the house in order, I think that’s critical. I think until we provide stability of housing for our students, we’re going to be ending up with a lot of turnover, failure, discouragement, etc.

Peralta is bracing for a budget plateau, brought on by enrollment declines and shifts in the funding model for California Community Colleges. A new analysis by Fitch Ratings expressed concerns about Peralta’s outlook, warning the district about the ripple effect that cuts could have on enrollment. How do you as a trustee seek to balance the continued costs of the Peralta district, the reality of its limited budget, and the needs of students?

First of all, I think that the so-called student centered funding formula doesn’t make a lot of sense. I think it’s inequitable. I think it’s particularly inequitable for high cost of living, urban districts. One of the things that we need to really do is revisit the politics of SCFF.

The challenge is going to be that other districts are doing fine with SCFF, and so we’re going to need to find a win-win-win solution. Part of what that means is going to the legislature and raising the base rate for how we fund community colleges. As you probably are well aware, the community colleges are grossly underfunded by any measure, but especially in comparison to the K-12 system, the CSU system and the UC system.

The other thing that we need to be doing is being all-in on the solution. And so in the past, what we’ve had is people fighting over crumbs. And I think the progress that we’re making is evident in the difference between the budget vote this year and the budget vote last year. Last year, the administration brought us a budget that was rejected by the shared governance, [Participatory Governance Council]. They basically said, “You know what? This process was so bad. Our input was so ignored that we’re just saying no.”

This year, it was unanimously approved. I think that makes a big difference. That kind of cooperation gives us the possibility of looking at real numbers and real solutions and really kind of going all-in, as opposed to half the people saying, “Well, we just don’t trust your numbers. We think you’re being overpaid, or we think that there’s waste, et cetera.”

We’re also just going to need to go back to the public. We’re going to need to renew a parcel tax and bring in additional revenue. The other thing is, City College San Francisco, they have special legislation protecting their institution. We need to do the same thing with the legislature. We’re a very special, unique circumstance with a particularly challenging population served, high costs. I think the legislature could recognize that and provide particular special funding for this district.

Since 2006, Alameda County voters have passed two bond measures totaling $1.19 billion to repair and upgrade Peralta’s facilities. Considering Peralta’s persistent facilities issues, how can voters and taxpayers depend on you this term to get these projects done?

I’m grateful that the voters have consistently supported Peralta. What we’ve seen with the new chancellor is a rigorous attention to detail and a rigorous attention to performance.

Look, General Services in this district consistently underperformed. It’s just a fact. And for 20 years, I watched it as a member of the minority in this district, and then finally, when we began to shift things in the board, we came under attack from the state chancellor’s office. There was division among board members. I don’t want to rehash that, because it’s done. It’s settled. And right now, we have a board that is unified and unified in purpose. We have an amazing Chancellor. We have a new Chief Operating Officer. We’re beginning to see a higher level of performance.

Look, we have an aging facility that’s just, that’s just the fact of the matter. Even with bond money that we have, we don’t have the money to fix what we have. Could we have better spent that money in the past? Absolutely. Right now, though, we’re finally in a position to be doing that, and I’m pleased to be part of this board. That’s why I wanted to come back to see us shine in ways that I don’t think we’ve ever shined.

Peralta’s new Interim Executive Director of Public Safety, Abdul Pridgen, recently voiced a desire to reintegrate police officers into the district’s security model. Where do you stand on this?

I have been among the chief proponents of shifting away from an armed police force at Peralta. The board for years was questioning the performance of the public safety services. There was a lot of discontent with the Sheriff’s Office.

After the murder of George Floyd, there was an opportunity, finally, to try something different. Trying something different is different than making it work right away. You know, there was a lot of like, hue and cry, defund the police. A lot of that was really justified. You had members of this community who were more afraid of the police than they were likely to go to the police for help. So we got rid of the sheriffs, and then, sadly, the next step that we did was quite disorganized, and I frankly, want to thank The Citizen for helping us avoid some pretty big mistakes that the administration was about to make. That was critical work that you did to help our district and our board understand better what needs to be done.

I have a lot of confidence in the current chancellor and in the current Interim Public Safety Director. We’ve got a situation where you’re not getting the performance that you want out of the Oakland Police. If you don’t have public safety officers who have the ability to intervene and to affect an arrest, then you’re reliant on OPD. But if OPD doesn’t show up, then you’re really vulnerable, and so we need to be really thoughtful and careful to make sure that in the extreme, rare situations where there is the possibility of violence, that our police forces are able to handle that in a way that is safe and sensitive.

But that can’t be the only thing that we’re doing. The other component of this is that we have a Public Safety and Wellness Task Force [sic], and the board has adopted a holistic health and safety and wellness plan that we will also pay attention to. I think the value of what Director Pridgen is talking about is developing a police force that is our police force. That is accountable to the ethos of this district. In the best of all worlds, would I prefer an unarmed police force? Yeah, but I don’t think that’s the world we live in. I think we live in a world where some people will engage in violence, and we need to be ready to meet that. And that’s unfortunate, but that should never be our first response.

In June 2023, you voted in favor of asking the state for $52 million to build a dorm at the College of Alameda, which was projected to cost the district an additional $42 million. Some faculty leaders criticized this initiative, pointing to the district’s current struggle to maintain its facilities. Where do you stand on this issue?

I have been an advocate for affordable student and faculty and staff housing for as long as I’ve been on the board. You could see the housing crisis that we have right now coming a thousand miles away.

For years, I struggled to try to get a majority on the board that would support the idea that it was our business to assist students and faculty and staff with housing. 20 years ago, when I came onto the board, the typical refrain was, “That’s not our business. We’re just here to educate students.”

I think that’s shifted quite a bit. We have basic needs centers on every campus. We have food pantries, we have staff who are paying attention to affordable housing. The next step is to build our own affordable housing.

Was that the project I would have picked? No, absolutely not, and I argued for other locations, other approaches. I thought that it was way too expensive, but it was a statement from the administration and from the board that this was an important need that we were going to concern ourselves with.

You know, there’s a common metaphor used about lawmaking and sausage, and you don’t want to see what goes into the sausage. Sometimes you’re not happy with exactly what went into it. That’s exactly what that vote was like. Do I want this project? Do I think this project is going to be the one that works? No, but is it important for this board to be on record as supporting affordable housing and supporting a vigorous role in building affordable housing, absolutely.

If it were me, I would do what other districts are doing, and that is, go to the public. I think there’s an appetite in the public right now for affordable housing, and I think this public loves community college students. You combine those two things, and I think you got a winning combination. We got a ton of land here. Let’s build on it. Let’s help the students who need help with housing. So that wasn’t my favorite piece of legislation or favorite vote on the board, but it was a compromise.

Six years ago, you told the San Francisco Chronicle, “There is an atmosphere of fear” at Peralta. Has this culture changed?

Oh, gosh, yes, absolutely. You know, when I made that comment, my colleagues in the board tried to censure me for making the comment. I mean, there was some irony in that, right?

A lot of people were really afraid to speak out. It wasn’t just that people were afraid of the board or that people were afraid of administrators. People were afraid of each other, that you’d have discord between classified workers and faculty orbit within the classified ranks.

We’ve got a different culture going on. Is it all fixed? Is it perfect? No, but I think the board went through a pretty rigorous process, first of changing the board. We changed the board there. It’s a different board than it was. Then the board took it upon itself to say, “What do we need to be doing to lead without discord? How can we not be attacking each other and instead, where we disagree, disagree on principle and make a coherent argument that we can all look at and then figure it out.”

The principal difference, in addition to the board, is we’ve got a different chancellor, and you only need about 30 seconds in the room with this chancellor to understand she’s a very different chancellor. She’s open. She admits mistakes, she is collaborative. She sets that tone, and I think that’s made a big difference. I’ll also say that we’re seeing a lot of cooperation out of the other shared governance constituent groups. So I think when you have leadership that models respect, it’s just a different world. It really is.

In August 2023, the district’s faculty union sent postcards to residents of your trustee area, asking them to contact you about the former chancellor Jannett Jackson’s $400k salary and “district-paid” $3500 per month apartment in Jack London Square. How did you respond?

I had some people write to me and say, “What is this ridiculous hit piece a year and a half before an election? What’s going on here?”

So one way to respond is just like, all right. Look, this is just a political hit piece. It doesn’t make a lot of sense. It’s very personal. It attacks a chancellor who is really working hard to try to help this district, a chancellor who came out of retirement gave up a very generous retirement package that she was entitled to, to come and work for us, moved back to the district to work for us, and so I have a lot of gratitude for Chancellor Jackson.

Was she perfect? No, it’s a hard, hard job. Did she make mistakes? Of course, everybody’s going to make mistakes. But I thought that the piece was really unfair, and I think that the people who sent it out knew it was unfair.

We were in the process of hiring a new chancellor when that piece went out. I just thought it was pretty irresponsible for the people who sent that piece out to attack a sitting Chancellor, sending a message that administrators who come to this district will be attacked. So one, I just thought, this isn’t a really good time. Two, this is really unfair.

The other thing that I think that that piece mentioned was that we had renewed the contracts of some interim vice chancellors, and I voted to do that because I didn’t want an interim chancellor making a permanent appointment for key administrative positions. I wanted to wait until we brought a new chancellor onboard and let her make the permanent choices about her team.

As it turned out, when we brought Tammeil on board, she looked at it and she said, “You know what, I think we can do without two vice chancellor positions.” So rather than hiring those positions permanently, which the proponents of that postcard wanted to do, we actually cut those positions and saved about $600,000.

So you go back and ask the question, did it make sense to fire a chancellor in the middle of a chancellor search or hire permanent vice chancellors when we were about to hire a new chancellor. I think history vindicates my votes quite well. And by the way, those votes were unanimous, it wasn’t just me. I think we’re in really good shape right now, and it was because of those votes.

On your website you said $500,000. Was it $500,000 or $600,000?

It’s a bit difficult to calculate because you have to look and say, “Alright, so, what’s the cost of a vice chancellor?” The cost of a vice chancellor is probably in the neighborhood of 200-and-something thousand. Then you’ve got benefits on top of that. So the exact calculation isn’t quite clear. Somewhere between five, six hundred thousand dollars I think is probably what we’re saving with those two permanent rollbacks and those positions.

[Editor’s note: According to Transparent California, total pay and benefits for former Interim Vice Chancellor of General Services Atheria Smith was $261,915.46 in 2023. For the former Interim Vice Chancellor of Finance and Administration Nathaniel Jones III, pay and benefits amounted to $288,802.45 in 2023.]

Favorite hiking trail in the Bay?

 I’m a bike dude. I like riding. I get on a bike every day. My wife and I ride tandem. I’m 65 now, we’ve been together for 45 years, 46 years. We met when we were 19. I ride a lot.

Right before I was here, I was riding from my house in Berkeley down to the Marina.

You ever go to the Berkeley Marina? It’s pretty spectacular. If you want to have an amazing setting in an urban environment, just head down to the water. Anything close to water is lovely.

I like Mount Tam. Steep Ravine Trail is sort of extraordinary. In the redwoods, along the creek. I thought you all were going to ask me about student empowerment, though. Because you are all at the leading edge of that. Anyway. But you didn’t.

That concludes all our questions today.

 I thought you were going to at least give me an open-ended, anything I wanted to talk about.

Sure. Anything else?

The thing you didn’t ask me about was students in particular. I want to just spend a minute thinking about this. I said I wanted to talk about student empowerment, and I think The Citizen is on the cutting edge on that work.

Until students in this district and throughout the state have a serious voice, we’re missing something really critical. We need to put a tension on that. This year we’ve got two very strong student trustees. Last year, second semester, the student trustees really took off and began helping to build a pipeline of student leadership. But I think we need to put a lot more attention on this. Basic stuff, like getting students to understand shared governance processes, like how do you sit on a budget committee, how do you understand what’s going on in that committee, how can you interact with your peers to really represent their voice, et cetera. There’s all sorts of ways in which we can do that.

Right now at the statewide level, we finally, for the first time ever, have a student government that is empowered and funded to actually make a critical difference. [The Student Senate for California Community Colleges] is a powerhouse right now, with a budget in the, I’m going to guess somewhere between $4 and $6 million a year. Which is better funded than the Faculty Association of California Community Colleges.

[Editor’s note: SSCCC’s 2024-25 budget is about $3.2 million]

The potential of student power, not only in this district, but across the state is a game-changer. A lot of elections are won by a handful of votes. Young voters typically are the least engaged voters. Imagine if we had community colleges as the foundation for the empowerment of young, diverse voters. Imagine what a difference that would make. I think it’s not just a raw power calculation, but it’s really also a calculation about competence. Because if we don’t respect and include voices of students in our decision making, then we’re missing something really important.

This is just going to sound like I’m gratuitously sucking up to you all, but I actually think that The Citizen is a really important powerful player in that realm. One of the things I did a couple years back was I had [Journalism Department Chair Eleni Gastis] and some of the leaders of The Citizen on the podcast that I do on student empowerment. So I really believe that and I want to thank you all for having me here and taking the time to be serious about who represents this community on the board.