Tensions surrounding the controversial Recreation and Wellness Center reached a boiling point after an Associated Students, Inc. staff member was allegedly attacked by an unidentified student in the Gymnasium on Oct. 30. The incident is currently under investigation, according to the Department of Public Safety.

According to ASI Marketing and Public Relations Director Mayra Saldena, what started as a sit-in during an ASI-sponsored event turned into a confrontation.

"He reached for my arm and pulled it with a lot of force," Saldena said. She said that an unidentified male tried to push the camera out of her hands while she was filming protesters in a stairwell of the Gymnasium.

The sit-in, organized by Student Unity and Power to challenge ASI to a public debate about the construction of the proposed Rec Center, took place at a "Dive-in Movie," a movie/pool party held at the Gymnasium.

The group of about 30-35 protesters included members of SUP, an organization concerned about the allocation of student money and diversifying the campus, as well as members from the Coalition Against the Recreation and Wellness Center and independent students campaigning against the project.

The protesters filed into the pool area around 9 p.m. and took their seats on the bleachers.

"We were the only ones there with the exception of maybe four other students who actually came to see the movie," said Cole Sanchez, 23, a fine arts major who took part in the protest that evening.

When the movie started, one of the protesters stood up and challenged ASI President Natalie Franklin to a debate, according to Sanchez.

"We chanted 'Hey, hey, ASI, we won't let you gentrify,'" Sanchez said. "They turned up the movie to drown us out."

Unhappy with the way ASI had been petitioning for the proposed recreation center, students from several campus organizations united to disrupt the movie.

"Normal protocol would require ASI to put the decision up to a student vote," Anastasia Gomes, a graduate student in women and gender studies, said. "But ASI received Corrigan's 'go' to circumvent that and have students decide in a petition process in which only 20 percent of the student body needs to approve the project."

Horace Montgomery, 37, ASI leadership development coordinator, helped organize the pool party and said that the protesting escalated into a confrontation between several of the students and Saldena when, after about 10 minutes of chanting, protesters received no response from ASI members and left.

"About 15 or 16 people exited the pool area through the bleachers, which leads towards Cox Stadium," Montgomery, who was not present in the stairwell where the alleged assault occurred, said. "When I saw her she was hysterical, saying that she was attacked."

"She was not assaulted," Gomes, who claims to have witnessed the confrontation, said. "The person told her repeatedly to stop filming."

According to Gomes, the student involved in the alleged assault pushed the camera out of his face, but did not grab Saldena's arm.

Saldena claims to have followed the students exiting and filmed them with her company camera.

"I followed them out with a camera to make sure they weren't defacing anything," Saldena said.

According to Sanchez, several of the protesters involved acknowledge that the student should not have reached for Saldena's camera, but insist that ASI is blowing the event out of proportion.

"I don't agree with him pushing the camera, but assault is with the intention to harm someone," Sanchez said. "He might have let his emotions influence his actions, but he did not intentionally attack her."

Several protesters, who wished to remain anonymous, said that the student involved in the alleged assault is an SUP member. The incident is still under investigation.

Sam Brown-Vasquez, 30, Coalition Against the Recreation and Wellness Center's leader, was not present at the sit-in. But he said that the group has repeatedly requested that ASI provide a public space for an open discourse about the construction of the $93 million center.

"We want to be a part of the decision-making," he said.

Gomes believes that, in the face of ASI's resistance to having a public debate with the Coalition and SUP, students are left with no options other than sit-ins and civil disobedience.

"We didn't want to confront them at a pool party," Gomes, who is one of the founders of SUP, said. "If ASI had said to us that they understand our demands for a discourse instead of ignoring and criminalizing us by taking pictures and telling us we don't have a right to be at a student event, we wouldn't have had to."

While Department of Public Safety is looking into the alleged assault, protesters plan to continue the fight against the recreation center -- but are also reflecting on their tactics.
"Seeing how ASI responded at the pool party," Sanchez said, "It made me realize how important it is for my voice to be heard."