Updated: President Barack Obama will be visiting the campus of Rutgers University-Newark during his visit on Monday, November 2.
Traffic in the area may be a bit snarled on Monday: President Barack Obama will be visiting Newark to meet with Mayor Ras Baraka and Senator Cory Booker and formerly incarcerated people to discuss criminal justice issues, according to NJ.com.
After that, Obama will head for New York City for Democratic National Committee and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee events, according to Politico New Jersey.
Rutgers University-Newark has confirmed that the President will be visiting the campus in this internal communication:
Dear Rutgers University – Newark community members,
I am thrilled to confirm that President Barack Obama will visit Rutgers University – Newark on Monday, November 2 in the latter part of the afternoon. For this historic visit, the White House, in collaboration with Senator Cory Booker and Mayor Ras Baraka, will invite national, regional, and local experts into focused discussion on issues about which we at RU-N—as an anchor institution in Newark—care very deeply and on which many of our faculty, staff, and students collaborate expansively with partners near and far: mass incarceration and re-entry. These are perfect examples of issues of significant importance not just in Greater Newark and New Jersey, but across metropolitan America and around the world.
The White House media advisory pasted below provides details on when and where this focused discussion will take place. Viewing of the event for members of the RU-N community will be via web stream at https://www.whitehouse.gov/live. We are working now to establish group viewing locations at RU-N; we will send an update about that over the weekend via email and social media. We have established a page on our website – https://newark.rutgers.edu/ – that we will keep updated with the latest information about this event.
As the Center for Law and Justice (CLJ) will be the locus of this tremendously important (if small in scale) visit, classes held in CLJ will be cancelled for the day and evening. Classes elsewhere will be conducted as scheduled and all administrative offices at Rutgers University – Newark will remain open and operational. Employees who regularly report to CLJ (e.g. Rutgers Law School; The Law Library; The Criminal Justice Library; The School of Criminal Justice; the Office of the Chancellor) are asked not to report for work during the day and will not be required to charge leave time. CLJ will reopen at 7 p.m. and the Law Library will open at the same time. Those employees regularly scheduled to work the evening shift in the Law Library should report to work at 7 p.m.
We are all familiar with the impact that a visit of this magnitude has on logistics—especially traffic patterns—in the vicinity of the event. For security reasons, there will be no access to Rutgers Parking Deck 1, the CLJ lot, and lot 502 on Bleeker Street. The following streets will be closed and parking on them prohibited from noon to 5 p.m. on Monday: Warren Street between Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (MLK) Boulevard and Washington Street; University Avenue between Warren Street and Central Avenue; Washington Street between Warren and Central; Linden Street; New Street between Washington and Halsey Streets; Bleeker Street between MLK Boulevard and Halsey Street. (The Bradley, Hill, and Smith Hall lots and Parking Deck 2 will still be available. Student Parking Deck 2, with its entrance on Washington Street, will be open and faculty/staff can park there for the day.) Consequently, we cannot emphasize strongly enough the wisdom of using public transportation to commute to and from RU-N on Monday, if at all possible, and accounting for extra time in commuting. We deeply appreciate your patience and flexibility in making special travel arrangements for this truly exceptional day in our university’s history.
It is a rare privilege for us to share in such a moment. Thank you, in advance, for your enthusiasm in welcoming our President!
Sincerely,
Nancy Cantor
Chancellor
