Kevin Riordan: Time for a detour on road to merging Rowan, Rutgers-Camden

Gov. Christie's proposal to merge Rutgers-Camden into Rowan University reminds me of . . . Admiral Wilson Boulevard.

Consider: A dozen years ago, a Republican governor named Christine Todd Whitman sought to transform South Jersey's notorious strip from sleazy to scenic.

You may remember that Whitman didn't want the boulevard's panorama of go-go joints and hot-sheet motels greeting her fellow Republicans on their way to the GOP's 2000 convention in Philly.

Pooh-poohed at first, her idea became a reality because people who knew how to use power and money agreed it should happen. And it was made feasible in part by bipartisan alliances of the sort Christie's far more audacious proposal is predicated upon.

New Jersey's current governor wants to decree a divorce between Rutgers-Camden and the rest of the statewide university system, while also officiating at a shotgun wedding between Rutgers-Camden and Rowan.

The merger is the least-detailed - and, to my mind, only ill-conceived - recommendation of a gubernatorial committee to help reshape higher education statewide.

The committee appears to have spent most of its time figuring out how best to divvy up the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey among Rutgers-New Brunswick and other institutions in the northern and central parts of the state.

"Let there be no mistake," Christie declared as he announced the proposal Jan. 25. "This is going to happen."

Few people in and around Camden immediately applauded the prospect of restructuring one of the city's few assets; Mayor Dana L. Redd released a statement so generically equivocal, it might have been about anything, or nothing.

But there was no such caution on the part of the Democratic majority of one named George E. Norcross 3d, whose fingerprints are magically everywhere and nowhere on the merger proposal.

Norcross is the chairman of Cooper University Hospital, which already plans to open a city medical school in partnership with Rowan this year. He predicts the merger will be "great for Camden and for South Jersey."

He also calls it an "exciting, inspired plan [that] can be the catalyst for the kind of renaissance that could make South Jersey an epicenter of intellectual and economic success for decades."

At Rutgers-Camden, meanwhile, the university community is organizing against this top-down proposal from the ground up.

Students, faculty, alumni, and others are outraged by the notion of a beloved alma mater disappearing into a haze of promises about a great South Jersey research university of the future; Richard L. McCormick, president of the Rutgers system, is starting to express concerns as well.

While there's some academic snobbery in the air - as if Rowan were some kind of komedy kollege, which it isn't - the Rutgers-Camden push back is persuasive.

Faculty point out that the power of the Rutgers brand can't be readily replicated, no matter how much money for new buildings may flow from Trenton to Camden. They cite as well the steadily increasing vitality of their campus, one of the few bright spots in a long-depleted downtown.

Supposedly, the new university will make up for decades of separate and unequal treatment for the Camden campus. And the proposal clearly would be a boost for Rowan, which has been on an impressive run for two decades.

But how much would the merger cost? How many jobs would be lost? What about the accreditations for Rutgers-Camden's law and business schools, the potential impact on the Rutgers Foundation, the likely exodus of top-tier faculty and students?

The merger would be far from a mere name change, and much more than a matter of tearing down a mile of strip-sprawl along Admiral Wilson Boulevard.

It's also worth remembering that Whitman initially wanted both sides of the roadway to become parkland, a notion that proved unrealistic.

Let's hope the people behind the merger also realize it's time to slow down, step back, and rethink.

at 856-779-3845, kriordan@phillynews.com, or @inqkriordan on Twitter.

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