CSUN Permits Fast Food but Is Slow to Approve Carl’s Jr.

Cal State Northridge officials decided Thursday to allow fast-food restaurants on the campus but sidestepped the thorny issue of allowing a Carl’s Jr., which won a campus taste poll but is opposed by groups that object to the political views of the chain’s founder.

After more than two hours of discussion, the CSUN Foundation board of trustees voted 7 to 2 to authorize the foundation management to negotiate with outlets such as Taco Bell, Baskin-Robbins and Subway.

Board members let stand for now their year-old decision not to purchase a franchise from Carl’s Jr., a restaurant chain bitterly fought by feminists and other campus groups opposed to the conservative politics of its founder, Carl Karcher.

However, they reserved the right to reconsider their position on Carl’s Jr. in light of a recent survey of 3,435 students, faculty and administrators that showed that chain to be the favorite fast-food outlet of respondents.

The foundation, a nonprofit, self-financed corporation, provides services to the university for which the school would be unlikely to receive state funds. In addition to most campus food services, it operates the bookstore and vending machines.

Lew Herbst, foundation associate director, said the foundation hopes to bring fast-food outlets to the campus by the fall.

“They’re a growing trend on campuses,” he said. “And we’re getting more off-campus competition.”

Trustee John Golisch moved to include Carl’s Jr. in the negotiations, saying, “It’s clearly the favorite.”

“This is purely a business and economic decision,” Golisch said, and should not be made on political grounds. “The issue is not Carl Karcher’s belief.”

But trustees decided that issue should be discussed at a future meeting.

Faculty President Albert Baca said he does not see how Carl’s Jr. can be eliminated if the university allows franchises on campus.

“It is wrong to attach political views to negotiations,” he said.

Baca argued that fast-food outlets do not belong on a college campus, which he said should be “a retreat from the outside world.”

To put fast-food franchises on campus, he said, “is to put the university in the business of business and not of education.”

Faith Manon Haaz, director of the campus Women’s Center, told trustees she will continue to oppose Carl’s Jr. because of Karcher’s financial contributions to the anti-abortion movement and because of a recent commercial she said made racial slurs against American Indians.