In a meeting with student government leaders Friday afternoon, University Provost John Moseley agreed to lower the energy fee by one-third next term.
The fee will be $20 per student in winter term, said Dan Williams, University vice president for administration, who also attended the meeting. The fee, which was added this year, was initially $30 per term.
The fee was lowered in response to conservation efforts by students and a natural gas bill that was less expensive than expected, Williams said. He said high enrollment also made lowering the fee possible, because more students are paying the fee than administrators originally anticipated.
At the meeting, ASUO President Nilda Brooklyn and Vice President Joy Nair proposed several ways to conserve energy on campus. Among their suggestions were specific proposals for reducing building heating and lighting costs, which Williams plans to discuss with the director of the University physical plant.
Brooklyn and Nair have spearheaded a campaign to get rid of the energy fee by eliminating the need. This term, the two women, along with ASUO staff members, formed a coalition with several student groups to increase energy conservation at the University. Through energy conservation, the coalition hopes to lower the University’s energy costs and do away with the need for an energy fee.
ASUO Elections Coordinator Courtney Hight, who is working with the conservation coalition, said the ASUO will kick off the campaign winter term with a dance in the ballroom and other “lights-out” events.
Other campaign plans include selling energy-efficient fluorescent light bulbs on campus for a reduced price and speaking to classes about the energy fee, she said.
Based on research by architecture professor and coalition adviser Charlie Brown and students in the architecture program, the group has come up with several ideas for saving energy on campus, Brooklyn said. These ideas include turning down the heat in University buildings and turning off lights in hallways, she said.
“We’re not wanting to put students in refrigerated classrooms,” she said. “But there have actually been reported temperatures of 85 degrees in some classrooms.”
Brooklyn said she is pleased with the way the conservation campaign is going and the willingness of administrators to discuss the energy fee. But her ultimate goal continues to be removing the fee altogether, she said.
“I’m not disappointed in the progress we’ve made in conservation, and the relationship we have with the administration, in terms of dealing with the energy fee,” she said. “Still, my main goal is repealing the energy fee.”
Williams said administrators will reevaluate the energy fee again at the end of winter term.