OC INSIDER: UCI Searching for New Rainmaker; Oral Roberts Sighted
br Rick Reiff
After four years as UCI’s chief rainmaker, Tom Moebus has set up a consulting business out of his Laguna Beach home. Gina Kelsch, formerly with UC Davis, is running the department on a consulting basis while UCI searches for a permanent replacement. Moebus quietly resigned as vice chancellor for advancement in August, just as a review of his department was completed. At the time he said he was taking a new position with UCI as special assistant for corporate research, but that didn’t happen. Collegiate fundraising is a tough business, especially in the faculty-ruled UC system; those who do it have the life expectancy of a baseball manager. Moebus had an MIT pedigree, but his background was engineering and tech transfer, not fundraising. Still, he put up numbers: Annual private support to UCI nearly tripled, to $88 million in FY 2000, and his pet project, University Research Park, went from a couple of buildings to 23. The tech boom surely helped, but lately the tech bust has hurt: Donations slipped to $52 million in FY 2001 and vacancies are up at the research park. Moebus said he has a client and several prospects and remains involved with the research park: “I wanted to do some things that are not necessarily within the purview of the university I think the chancellor wanted to go in some new directions.” UCI Executive Vice Chancellor Michael Gottfredson noted Moebus’ fundraising achievements but declined to comment on reasons for the departure There are easier ways to get into this column: OCBJ employees assisted a man who suffered a bloody nose after slipping on the steps outside the paper’s offices last week. It turns out he was evangelist Oral Roberts. The 83-year-old Roberts, who has a condo at Newport Beach CC, was visiting the Irvine building with wife Evelyn to get year-end tax advice from his money manager, Richard Adler of The Seidler Cos. Paramedics checked Roberts as he kidded with relieved bystanders, and the couple left on their own Gov. Gray Davis campaign adviser Bob Mulholland, noting Enron’s woes, observed to the Insider, “We might not have them to kick around next fall” Mark McGwire won’t be alone on his Shady Canyon spread. Big Mac is engaged to Stephanie Slemer, 24, daughter of a suburban St. Louis bricklayer Another Dem who helped with the George Argyros ambassadorship: Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido.
