UC Irvine’s Black Student Union (BSU) held a town hall meeting to address an escalation in racially-motivated incidents on campus on Monday, April 13. The event included representatives from UCI Campus Police (UCIPD), the Cross-Cultural Center, UCI’s African American Studies Department and UCI Admissions.
BSU leaders shared a number of objectives including campus safety and institutional accountability, as well as transparency and campus responses to crime and hate incidents.
The first question the panel was asked was “how does UCI ensure that reports of [violence], harassment or threats against Black students are taken seriously and addressed in a timely and effective manner?”
The question called back to a recent hate incident which occurred Feb. 27 at the Arroyo Vista Housing Community. Therein, a Black UCI student was pursued by teenagers riding e-bikes, called a number of racial slurs and was almost “run … off the road,” according to a BSU statement via Instagram.
The incident at Arroyo Vista Housing Community has garnered attention from major outlets like CBS LA and NBC LA.
BSU’s statement also mentioned that “typically, when incidents affecting campus safety occur, students receive a ZotAlert via both email and text message. In this case students only received an email.”
Students and community members like President of NAACP Orange County Deirdre R. Harris wondered why students were encouraged to come up with solutions to the problem when many believed the issue stemmed from UCIPD’s inconsistency in addressing campus safety issues.
“What was it about these incidents that would require so much civil disobedience before these issues get addressed?” Chancellor’s Professor of African American studies Frank B. Wilderson III said, who was also in the crowd.
The conversation turned to questioning police representatives about why the ZotAlert wasn’t sent out, though they are sent out for similar safety-related campus episodes.
“You know, do you read those emails? We don’t want that same thing to happen with [them]. So that was my meaning by saying water down … I don’t ever want it to be that you get a lot of [them] where you don’t look at it because you’re really seeing so much. That was my initial intent,” said UCIPD staff member Crystal Rae Lugo-Shearer, who is tasked with maintaining Clery Act compliance.
Students voiced concern that the Palestine protests and encampments, which occurred on campus in 2024, warranted a larger number of ZotAlerts — they asserted that they felt UCIPD was minimizing issues relevant to Black students’ safety.
“We just see a lack of proactivity, a lack of awareness, just a lack of prioritization, not only from PD, but multiple departments on this campus,” third year political science and criminology major and BSU President Eunique Sherow told New University.
Lieutenant Matt Mahoney described the case as “an open investigation” during the town hall. The outrage surrounding the case and similar violence has increased following the most recent hate crime at Plaza Verde which housing students were only notified of through email Monday, April 13 early in the morning.
“The reporting party shared that the occupants of a grey or silver truck were yelling derogatory terms based on their actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender expression, while they threw candies and a rock at the reporting party,” UCIPD said in a Crime Alert email.
Regarding the investigation and use of ZotAlerts, Sherow asked for transparency and consistency.
“I feel like, one black student, a student that goes to UCI … represents the university as a whole, because they attend the University of California, Irvine,” Sherow said. “So I feel like if it only affects one student … it should be deemed as an imminent threat and taken as seriously as any other imminent threat.”
Students witnessing or experiencing hate crimes should always contact emergency services. Anyone can report hate crimes and incidents to the California Civil Rights Department.
Aidan Wyrough is a Features Staff Writer for the spring 2026 quarter. He can be reached at awyrough@uci.edu.
Edited by Avery Rosas and Geneses Navarro.
