By Meghann M. Cuniff
SENIOR NEWS REPORTER
Memories of past University planning projects gone awry were in the air at the University Senate meeting Wednesday as two motions giving the Senate more power in the planning process passed unanimously with minimal discussion.
One motion requires that the University administration report to the Senate on major projects “at the earliest date that is reasonable and always prior to seeking authorization for funding of capital construction.” The other adds a member of the Senate to the Campus Planning Committee and requires the committee to submit oral and written reports to the Senate on a regular basis.
After the vote, University Senate President Andrew Marcus mentioned the “quite unpleasant vote” that occurred at a November 2003 Senate meeting condemning the process the University administration was using to select a basketball arena site.
Marcus praised the fact that the Senate is now working with the planning office and the administration to find “ways to avoid future situations” such as that one and thanked those involved for their work in crafting the two motions’ language.
University Senate Vice President Peter Keyes said while presenting the motions that past Senate discussions have touched on many of the issues addressed in the motions. Keyes said that the Campus Planning Committee becomes involved with a project “after the project is pretty far along in terms of moving forward,” according to the Senate.
“It was brought up here at the Senate meeting that that’s pretty far along in the process; a lot of projects may be on the horizon or over the horizon,” Keyes said.
Keyes said the motion asking the administration to report to the Senate about projects as early as possible is aimed at quelling problems with projects progressing too quickly without input from the body representing the University’s faculty and staff.
In the past, projects have come to the Senate, and Keyes said, “at that point the faculty as a whole sits up and says ‘Hey where did this idea come from, who’s idea was this and where is it going and why weren’t we consulted’ and raises a bunch of objections that, frankly, things would be much better if the administration had involved people further much earlier in the process.”
The second motion regarding Senate membership on the Campus Planning Committee and requirements for the committee’s relationship with the Senate is aimed at increasing communication that members have expressed is currently lacking, Keyes said.
“We’re asking that the Campus Planning Committee be in the middle of the discussion between the planning staff, the administration and the committee to make us aware of the important projects going forward or things that may be coming along,” Keyes said.
After Keyes presented the first motion, one senator asked if anyone could identify anything wrong with it, causing the members to erupt in laughter.
The resolution passed by the Senate in November 2003 that Marcus mentioned was in response to the administration’s disregarding University planning policies by not giving the Senate a chance to review the original proposed arena site, Howe Field.
University President Dave Frohnmayer announced in February 2004 the indefinite postponement of the arena project, citing funding problems. Talk of the arena restarted later in the year, and University officials say the tentative site is now the recently acquired Williams’ Bakery site.
Finance instructor and Senator Jeanne Wagenknecht said after the meeting that the motions seemed like necessary steps to keep the University faculty involved in important planning decisions.
Wagenknecht’s husband, Karl, owns a medical office in close proximity to the Williams’ Bakery site. University officials have said the office needs to move if an arena is to be constructed, but the Wagenknechts have expressed to community members their unwillingness to move.
Wagenknecht told the Emerald she does not know anything more about the situation than what has been printed already in the newspapers.
Also at the meeting, University Senior Vice President and Provost John Moseley updated the Senate on the search for a vice president for administration and finance, which he expects to be completed within two weeks.
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