THE UNIVERSITY OF THE PACIFIC’S planned medical school may not get financial backing from San Joaquin County after a plan that came before the Board of Supervisors was met with internal pushback.
The board decided Tuesday to put off making a decision on a potential donation to the medical school project at the Stockton-based university after one supervisor expressed reservations. The proposal is now expected to resurface at the board’s Nov. 10 meeting.
Even though the bulk of the funds would come from money left unspent during the 2025-26 fiscal year, Supervisor Robert Rickman called the plan “absolutely irresponsible” at a time when the county has been “telling everyone in the world that will listen” how tight funds have become. The county pleaded for more money from the California Legislature, played tough in labor negotiations and spurned requests for donations seeking to fund worthy causes.
As such, granting money for the UOP endeavor comes at “a horrible time to do it,” Rickman said.
One speaker in the audience pointed out that the donation would be going to a private university, not a state institution, where such a gift would be easier to justify. UC Davis, roughly an hour away from Stockton, has a School of Medicine, for example.
The chief backer of the proposal was Supervisor Paul Canepa. He initially requested $3 million, but knocked the request down to $2 million by the end of the discussion. He noted that the county is in critical need of more physicians and a medical school would strengthen healthcare for local residents.
“We’ll have a place for folks to go and be trained in our community and hopefully stay,” he said. “Three million (dollars) now from the county of San Joaquin shows we have skin in the game.”
His suggestion drew support from Supervisor Steven Ding, who sees the investment as a way to bolster the county financially. “We’ve got to grow our way out of this,” Ding said.
Skin in the game
Announced in March, the UOP School of Medicine is expected to cost about $150 million and is projected to open in 2030. It already has garnered local support from the Stockton City Council, which voted in March to support the university’s effort to obtain federal money to buy teaching equipment for the prospective medical school.
The university is investing about $50 million of its own money in the project. But Rickman asked why it wasn’t spending more.
UOP President Christopher Callahan told the board that the university has an endowment of about $800 million, but most of it is restricted funds — designated by the donor for a specific school or program. While UOP could try to use more of its own money for the medical school, Callahan said a gift from the county would spur more donations from the philanthropic community.
If the county does chip in, it won’t be alone. The California Legislature passed a bill last month that would contribute $2 million in state funds toward the new school. The budget bill was pushed by Assemblymember Rhodesia Ransom, D-Stockton, and state Sen. Jerry McNerney, D-Pleasanton. Both of their districts include sections of Stockton. Gov. Gavin Newsom enacted the legislation on Sept. 18.
UOP is also seeking $7 million in federal funds. The Stockton City Council voted unanimously in March to sponsor the university’s request for Community Project Funding distributed by U.S. Rep. Josh Harder, D-Tracy, who represents California’s 9th Congressional District.
This story originally appeared in Stocktonia.