Walters: UC Merced turns 20, but remains California’s awkward stepchild

The Legislature’s budget analyst, Gabe Petek, is marking the 20th anniversary of University of California’s Merced campus with an overview of how it has fared.

In polite language, Petek fundamentally says the campus has fallen well short of its enrollment targets, requires much more state aid than other UC branches to operate, has not had the big economic impact that its advocates promised, and really wasn’t needed to relieve student applications.

“Since 2005, the UC system has added...