By Mark Muckenfuss

Cal State Monterey Bay took its latest step in growing its campus on Thursday, Aug. 22, when it launched a project to build the new Edward “Ted” Taylor Science and Engineering Building. 

About 300 people attended the launch event on a site just south of the university’s College of Science. CSUMB administrators, representatives from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and contingents from Taylor Farms and Otto Construction were among those on hand. The nearly $40 million building is being named after the late Edward “Ted” Taylor. 

In her opening remarks, CSUMB President Vanya Quiñones thanked the Taylor family as a major donor for the project, acknowledged NOAA’s contribution and talked about how the new building would bolster CSUMB’s programs. She expects it to strengthen what she called the already “esteemed marine science program” and provide a launching pad for a new major.

“With this investment, our university will become a leader in mechatronic technologies, which are pivotal for improving efficiency, sustainability and the economic capabilities of our local agricultural industries,” Quiñones said. 

Bruce Taylor, chairman and CEO of Taylor Fresh Foods, spoke during the project launch. He said the mission of the new building aligned with his father’s approach to business.

“He was the consummate entrepreneur,” Taylor said of his father. There was plenty of competition among the growers in Salinas Valley, he added, “and he loved to compete. How do you compete? You figure out a way to do it better. You innovate.”

Ted Taylor oversaw perfecting a better way of extending the life of fresh-picked strawberries and the concept of packaged salads, resulting in the company Fresh Express.

Taylor said continued innovation in agriculture is critical and he expects the new building to play an important role. 

“Right now, we’re [recruiting} engineers from Mexico,” Taylor said. “We need to build that muscle locally. What better way to do that than to partner with Cal State Monterey Bay? You are the lighthouse.”

The Taylor Building will include laboratory and collaborative student spaces for marine science and serve as home to the new mechatronics engineering program, which admits its first students this fall. It will also house the offices of NOAA’s Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. 

The latter presence was made possible by a $7 million portion of the $50 million NOAA received from the Inflation Reduction Act, partly through the efforts of Rep. Jimmy Panetta.

John Armor, director of the Office of National Marine Sanctuaries, said moving NOAA’s Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary to the CSUMB campus from its current offices near Monterey’s Fisherman’s Wharf will strengthen the longstanding relationship between the agency and the university.

“Having a multipurpose space will allow our staff to interact with faculty and students,” Armor said. “We can have some of those impromptu brainstorming sessions that are really exciting.”

Armor told the crowd that good science leads to informed policy-making in Washington, D.C.  

“This building is going to be a great foundation for that,” he said. 

Lawson told the crowd that other programs would benefit as well. 

“With (NOAA’s marine) sanctuaries embedded on our campus,” he said, “we have potential for our environmental science, agriculture and sustainable hospitality and tourism management programs to forge new partnerships.”

Paul Scholz, deputy assistant administrator for NOAA’s National Ocean Service, compared the closer alliance of his agency with CSUMB to that of the Channel Island NOAA office which is housed on the UC Santa Barbara campus. That arrangement, he said, has led to many collaborations. 

“This is just the beginning for NOAA,” Sholz said. 

Panetta was at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago and unable to attend the project launch. He did send a video address in which he said the new building was an example of continued commitment to ocean conservation.

“What better place for the location of this office than right here at CSUMB,” Panetta said, “a place where students, scientists and environmentalists come together to learn, collaborate and do more on conservation efforts so that they too can fulfill the responsibilities necessary in protecting the well-being of the sanctuary and become future stewards of our community.”

The building, he said, “will really be the foundation not only for our continued leadership in marine science and conservation, but also for the protection of the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary.”