Likins calls for unity between UA, Tucson

Arizona Daily Wildcat President Peter Likins talks to reporters after giving a speech to a group of 200 people yesterday at the Sheraton Tucson Hotel and Suites. Likins told the audience that business leaders and the UA need to join forces and strengthen Tucson's economy.

"There's something missing here and it does bother me," Likins said. "Where's the collective will to succeed?"

Likins addressed about 200 people yesterday during a University of Arizona economic development office-sponsored luncheon at the Sheraton Tucson Hotel and Suites, 5151 E. Grant Road.

"Where is the collective commitment to building this economy?" Likins asked the luncheon group. "I worry about it -Êwhen I go to Phoenix and when I look around here."

Likins blamed disagreements between business, academia and political leaders for blocking economic progress.

"I'm troubled by the fact that there's a lot of energy dissipated in this Tucson environment (because of) quarreling," he said. "We must get past it ... or we're going to be dithering around while other people zoom passed us."

But Likins praised the UA's Optical Sciences Department, saying Tucsonans need to make optics a high priority.

"If we're not the center of a giant optics industry 10 to 20 years from now, it will be because we threw it away," he said. "It can happen here."

Likins and Bruce Wright, associate vice president for economic development, unveiled a new UA publication yesterday called "Business Matters." Wright said the project is a "story-telling" venture.

"We're kicking off an aggressive corporate relations strategy," Wright told the luncheon audience. "We also want to listen to you and bring back to the university your concerns."

Wright said the UA will also design a one-day community forum to deal with the problems.

Janet Bingham, the newly-appointed UA vice president for advancement, said she will work with Wright to set up the forum.

"(We'll invite) really a broad supply of people who really have an interest in seeing that the community is successful," she said after the luncheon.

Aside from the UA, Likins also asked business leaders to support state community colleges and high schools, making educational advancement a focus in Arizona.

"We have to have damn good schools or we're not going to have a strong economy," he said. "It's a knowledge-based economy and that means it's an education-based economy."

During his luncheon talk, Likins also said some academic institutions, including the UA, are perceived as suffering from an "ivory-tower syndrome."

"We are no longer in the ivory tower," he said. "We have to do a job together. We're not going to have a successful university if we don't have a successful economy around us."

After the luncheon, Likins said that in an ideal world it would be best for the UA to be separated from its surrounding community.

"The university must presume a constant distance from the community so it can pursue its intellectual work without the distraction of everyday life," he said. "It's not a bad idea as long as money falls from the heavens, but money no longer falls from the heavens."

Mark Zupan, dean of the business and public administration college, said Likins, in a "good way," challenged the community.

"We all need to step it up a notch," Zupan said. "If we don't run with our opportunity, we'll fall behind in comparison with other places in the world."

David J. Cieslak can be reached via e-mail at David.J.Cieslak@wildcat.arizona.edu.