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VOL. 12,
NO. 286
Cal State gives $340K job to ex-president who Therapy in a tent: The healthcare many homeless Californians stepped down after discrimination lawsuit need but aren’t getting By Phoebe Huss, CalMatters
By Marisa Kendall, CalMatters
This story was originally published by CalMatters.
This story was originally published by CalMatters.
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California State University president who stepped down following a multi-million dollar settlement in a case accusing him of gender-based discrimination and harassment will earn a six-figure salary this coming year while he’s in between Cal State jobs. During the transition period, former Cal State San Bernardino President Tomás Morales will provide international consulting for Cal State and work on strengthening the university’s international initiatives and global partnerships. Morales announced his plans for departure last August and officially left the university at the end of this school year, joining an executive transition program in which he will be paid $343,920 over a yearlong period starting this August. This salary is typical for Cal State executives in this program, said Cal State Chancellor Mildred Garcia, who announced Morales’ interim role at a board of trustees committee meeting Wednesday. The board of trustees also unanimously granted Morales president emeritus status Wednesday afternoon, a title given as a gesture of appreciation for his service to the university. Morales, and a former dean at San Bernardino’s Palm Desert campus, Jake Zhu, were accused of genderbased discrimination, harassment and retaliation in a 2023 lawsuit that Cal State recently settled for $12 million. Clare Weber and Anissa Rogers, both former San Bernardino administrators, alleged they were instructed to resign after reporting a gender
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Ex-Cal State San Bernardino President Tomás Morales. | Photo courtesy of California State University
pay gap and discriminatory bullying to higher-ups. Cal State continues to deny any wrongdoing and determined Morales to be in good standing, which renders him eligible for the transition program. Executives may become ineligible if the chancellor finds they violated university policy or engaged in serious misconduct. Weber, who alleged she was fired weeks after asking Morales for a raise over email to bridge what she called a gender-based pay gap, said the ex-president should not remain in good standing. Male Cal State employees “are protected when they behave badly, when they mistreat women, when they harass women, when they retaliate against them,” Weber said. “The tendency is to protect the university.” Morales’ office did not respond to a request for
comment. Morales, new campus president still high earners During the year-long transition period, Morales will be required to submit a monthly report to the chancellor chronicling “activities and milestones completed,” according to a board document. “President Tomás Morales has served Cal State San Bernardino with distinction for 14 years, demonstrating exceptional leadership on behalf of the university and his students,” Garcia said at the meeting. Morales will also provide guidance and support to incoming Cal State San Bernardino president S. Terri Gomez, Garcia said at the meeting. Gomez, the current provost and vice president of Academic Affairs at Cal Poly See Cal State Page 27
Pomona, will assume the role on Aug. 3. The committee approved a $426,916 annual salary, $60,000 annual housing allowance, and additional auto allowance of $1,000 per month for Gomez when she takes office. Gomez made $338,255 in base pay in 2024, per the latest available data from Transparent California. In 2024, 69 out of Cal State’s 118,843 employees earned a salary higher than $343,920, according to the State Controller’s Office. Morales’ salary was $527,834 in 2024 — the sixth-highest earning salary in the Cal State system, behind the chancellor and four other campus presidents. The average university salary in 2024 was $39,870, according to the office.
ike many people who are or have been homeless, Jessica Scott struggles with debilitating anxiety. When she finally moved from her stepfather’s car into a Sacramento apartment a few weeks ago, she said one thing played a major role in helping her take that step: Therapy. “When you’re panicking so much that you can’t really talk to people, it’s difficult to do anything,” Scott said. That included making – and keeping – the numerous appointments required to find subsidized housing. Scott used to have her therapy sessions with Anthony Villanueva, a clinician with One Community Health, on a park bench because she had nowhere else to go. But her most recent session in early July was on a blowup couch in her new living room. She credits her ability to get this housing — her first in two and a half years — partially to Villanueva teaching her breathing exercises to calm herself down. Media stories, politicians and splashy state-funded mental health initiatives tend to focus on people who live on the street in the grip of psychosis or other severe mental illnesses — a highly visible but statistically uncommon problem. That overlooks a much quieter but more widespread issue: All across California, unhoused people are suffering at alarming rates from less obvious but potentially enervating mental health conditions, including anxiety, depression and posttraumatic stress disorder. Some of those people manage to navigate the
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healthcare system, find a therapist and make regular trips to a clinic. Most do not. To fill that void, therapists are meeting their patients wherever they are, conducting therapy in a tent, a homeless shelter or a car on the side of the road. That care is a major help to people like Scott. But there are far from enough street therapists to see everyone. Recent estimates put California’s homeless population at nearly 182,000, and a UCSF study of homeless Californians found that 48% of them reported symptoms of serious depression and 51% reported anxiety. Doctors, nurses and clinicians who work with people on the street told CalMatters the numbers are even higher. They estimate between 80% and 90% of their patients have a mental health condition that could benefit from therapy – most commonly depression, anxiety and PTSD. “I have no capacity to see the amount of patients that we have,” said social worker Lisette Carmona, who provides street therapy in Los Angeles with the USC street medicine team. That’s despite the fact that street medicine, which brings basic medical care (sometimes including therapy) directly to homeless people in encampments and shelters, has rapidly expanded over the past few years. What started in the 1990s as a small, grassroots movement has ballooned into at least 70 teams in 34 counties in California, said USC Street Medicine Director Brett Feldman, who is considered one of the founding