WOODLAND — The Yolo County District Attorney’s office will extend an offer for a plea deal to 12 protesters facing criminal charges for their role in the blockade of the U.S. Bank branch at UC Davis.

Michael Cabral, Yolo County assistant chief deputy district attorney, said that the 11 students and one professor will be offered 80 hours of community service in exchange for guilty pleas to misdemeanor charges.

“That 11 years (jail time) that’s been floating around out there is not a realistic maximum,” Cabral said.

Dubbed the “banker’s dozen” by supporters, they are being charged with obstructing movement on a street or in a public place and conspiracy to commit a misdemeanor.

The conspiracy charge carries a maximum penalty of one year in jail. Each count of obstruction, also a misdemeanor, carries a penalty of up to six months in jail. Individual protesters face as many as 20 counts, but Cabral said he would not seek to “stack” penalties to misdemeanors.

The protesters are now scheduled to enter their pleas Thursday, May 10.

On Friday, Yolo County Superior Court Commissioner Janene Beronio continued the arraignments of 11 students and one professor while many of them seek legal counsel.

They could be ordered to pay more than $1 million to compensate U.S. Bank for its losses.

In a letter to the campus Friday, Chancellor Linda Katehi and Provost Ralph Hexter wrote that UCD would not seek restitution. Cabral said he had not yet heard from the bank or bank customers listed as victims.

Cabral said that UCD, not the bank, first contacted the DA’s office.

Wrote the chancellor and provost, “We fully expect the district attorney and his staff to balance the rights of all the parties involved and to pursue remedies that are appropriate, fair-minded and just in the full context of what occurred on this campus.”

Affiliated with Occupy UC Davis, but acting on their own in this instance, the protesters blocked the entrance to the branch starting Jan. 2, causing it to close early, day after day. On March 12, the bank informed customers it would shut its doors for good.

U.S. Bank terminated a 10-year deal with UCD, signed in 2009, which was to have brought in upwards of $3 million for student services.

The bank and campus each have accused the other of not doing its part to end the protests. The sides remain in talks, according to UCD spokesman Barry Shiller.

The protesters contend that campus leaders — having faced a public outcry after the Nov. 18 pepper-spraying of protesters — are now using the court system to silence activists who targeted the branch partly as a symbol of what they see as the privatization of the University of California system.

Shiller has said that UCD staff repeatedly made efforts to speak with protesters and to inform them of the charges they might face if the blockade continued.

Wrote Katehi and Hexter, “All of us have an obligation to help ensure that the rights of one person or group do not interfere with the rights of others. When there are conflicts between these rights that cannot be resolved amicably on our campus, as will occur from time to time anywhere there is spirited civic discourse, we look to the laws of our state and nation for guidance.”

One of the protesters, English professor Joshua Clover, said in an email message that he had not yet heard the details of the plea deal from an attorney. Cabral said that the court likely chose not to convey the offer Friday because many of the accused lacked counsel.

Of the letter by the chancellor and provost, Clover wrote: “The chancellor’s commitment to honoring political protest is well-documented. I encourage her to honor her own commitment to accountability and step down.”

Supporters of the accused protesters have urged others to contact to the DA’s office and ask for charges be dropped. Cabral said that his office had received “quite a few” telephone calls in recent days.

— Reach Cory Golden at [email protected] Follow him on Twitter at @cory_golden.