University Times

The draft report of the University Capital Planning Committee lists $361 million worth of renovation and construction projects that the committee recommends Pitt undertake over the next decade.

The document emphasizes renovating existing facilities, addressing the University's backlog of deferred maintenance projects, and improving student housing, athletics and recreation facilities.

But during an Oct. 16 University Senate forum on the document, planning committee members emphasized what the plan is not as much as they discussed what the plan does represent.

Among other things, they said, the plan is not: * Final (yet) or inflexible.

* A detailed space allocation document.

* A kiss of death for units that aren't mentioned.

Chancellor Mark Nordenberg and planning committee members who attended the Senate meeting pledged to consider comments, criticisms and suggestions from the University community in putting together the final version of the report. Nordenberg said he will submit the final plan to the Board of Trustees property and facilities committee Dec. 4. Any project costing $1 million or more would require approval first by the trustees' budget committee and then by the full board or its executive committee.

Senate committees, among other campus groups, plan to submit detailed comments to the planning committee. (See Oct. 10 University Times for summaries of 10 of the Senate committees' comments.) Planning committee member Robert Pack, vice provost for Academic Planning and Resources Management, said: "This document doesn't try to determine how much space, or the quality of space, every unit should receive. Instead, it determines the broad parameters of space that the University can afford, and the factors that should drive increases in the amount of that space." The plan emphasizes preserving and modernizing existing classrooms, offices and other facilities, Pack noted. "There will be a conscious and clear effort to bring every facility up to a higher standard than it is now," he said.

Pack emphasized that even the final plan will not be carved in bricks and mortar. Academic units will be asked to reassess their priorities throughout the next decade and beyond, he said. "Departments change. Academic opportunities present themselves in unexpected ways. And it is obviously an unwise institution that is so locked into a concrete mindset that it can't take advantage of those opportunities," Pack said.

Among the high-priced, previously proposed projects that the planning committee endorses are construction of a $52 million convocation center/basketball arena and a $32.4 Multi-Purpose Academic Complex, and $52.5 million in additions and renovations to Hillman Library.

Two major projects that the committee rules out are construction of a College of Business Administration building and renovation of Bellefield Hall as an arts center. Instead, the committee's plan recommends locating CBA in existing space plus one floor of the multi-purpose complex. And the plan calls for renovating parts of Bellefield Hall as a student recreation center this year, with a long-term goal of converting the building into a combined rec center and residence hall.

Pack said the committee ruled out the Bellefield Hall arts center plan as being too expensive and contrary to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences' own long-range plan, which rated the arts as low-priority units. "It was very clear that the academic priorities of the arts and sciences did not place heavy emphasis on the arts. And the intention of the committee was to bring forward a capital plan reflecting as clearly as possible the academic priorities of the University," Pack said.

Even so, Pitt will spend $300,000 this year to upgrade arts department facilities, according to Pack.

In response to a question from the Senate audience, Pack said he believed the committee would have reached the same conclusions about Bellefield Hall if the group had included more faculty members. The committee, appointed by the senior administration and chaired by Provost James Maher, includes 13 administrators (six of them with faculty appointments) and one professor, Thomas A. Anderson of geology and planetary sciences. Anderson is a former co-chair of the Senate's plant utilization and planning committee.

Just because a school or department isn't mentioned in the capital plan doesn't mean that unit has no future at Pitt, Pack said. "I understand that perception, though. Probably, we'll try to mention everybody as the document is re-drafted," he said. "We want a document around which the University community can rally." It was clear from the Senate meeting and other public discussions that not everyone is rallying around one element of the plan, its endorsement of the convocation center.

Fil Hearn, a professor in the history of art and architecture department, said the capital planning effort seems to be "governed by the overriding necessity of having a big, fancy basketball center and also pouring more money into football." Pitt should re-think its commitment to big-time college sports, which have little relevance to the University's academic mission, Hearn said. In comparing the University's sports facilities with those of other schools, he said, Pitt "should in fact be adopting the University of Chicago and NYU as being comparable, and not Ohio State and Penn State and other schools that belong to a less urban and less sophisticated environments.

"We should not allow a few trustees and some very vocal alumni to govern our priorities for us," Hearn said.

Capital planning committee members noted that their plan recommends financing the ongoing Pitt Stadium renovations exclusively through private gifts, and the convocation center through private gifts and previously committed state money.

As for the plan's support for the convocation center and improving student recreation facilities, committee member Kenneth F. Metz said the document had to take into account two factors: Pitt's traditional status as a NCAA Division IA institution and the trustees' goal of upgrading the quality of campus life for undergraduates.

Metz, who is dean of the School of Education, said the capital committee ruled out recommending construction of a student activities center that would be off-limits to varsity sports teams. Not only would such a center cost more than the proposed Pitt convocation center, but it would fail to address the University's need for more athletics space for intramural as well as varsity teams, Metz said.

Another committee member, Dennis P. McManus, said the plan will help Pitt make a more persuasive case for deferred maintenance funds from the state for next year. The document includes a building-by-building inventory of deferred maintenance needs, linking those needs to Pitt's academic priorities.

McManus, assistant vice chancellor for Governmental Relations, said he was not aware of any other state-funded university in Pennsylvania with a comparably well-documented capital needs plan.

–Bruce Steele