By Rosemary Peters
The topic of construction was the high point at UP's first fireside chat with the Rev. E. William Beauchamp, C.S.C., last Wednesday.
The idea for the fireside chats was the brainchild of three UP senators, sophomores Colin Dorwart and Sasha Tenzin and senior Chris Brox.
"The majority of the questions that night were about the future of the University in terms of physical updates," Dorwart said.
From the get-go, Beauchamp dived into talking about all of the buildings that are being remodeled on campus and buildings that are next in line for remodeling.
According to Beauchamp, the decision for which building is to be remodeled oftentimes depends first on need and second on benefactors.
The main building of discussion was Howard Hall. Although Beauchamp made it clear there is no real timeline or plans to rebuild Howard in upcoming years, he made it very clear that it needs to be done.
"My goal is to have a new recreational facility by the time I leave my office," Beauchamp said.
In one of the lighter moments of the evening, Beauchamp even made a good-natured jab at the state of Howard Hall.
"What strikes me as being very appropriate is the 48 star flag on the basketball court," Beauchamp said. "I was approached about taking the flag down, and I said absolutely not. I hope the students from Alaska and Hawaii don't feel unwelcome."
Other construction plans which were touched on at the Fireside Chat included plans to remodel the library and plans for River Campus.
In 2008, Beauchamp created a coalition to look into ways to update the current library. The coalition came up with the advisement that there was no way to properly update the library without building an entirely new one. A further twist that came with this advisement was that the coalition believed that the best place to build the new library is right where the old one sits.
"This makes it very hard," Beauchamp said. "We run into many problems including where do we house the old library while the new one is being built?"
As to the subject of River Campus, Beauchamp dived into a few of the plans already forming around the new property. These plans include moving the baseball field, the tennis court and Physical Plant to River Campus and remodeling their current locations with new buildings such as classrooms and a new recreational sports facility.
Another plan is to build a six-level parking garage into the side of The Bluff and building over the current parking lot. According to Beauchamp, these building plans would shift the center of campus tremendously and may one day mean moving the main entrance to campus to Portsmouth.
A second topic of the night that received much attention was the fate of the school in relation to the state of the economy.
According to Beauchamp, UP's endowment took a 30 percent hit this year as a result of the economic downturn. This loss is equivalent to a $2 million question mark in the $90 million budget.
This means that ?administrators are not entirely sure where they are going to get the money to cover the $2 million dip, but they are certain they will. According to Beauchamp, this money will likely be covered by tuition and cutbacks in expenses on campus.
"When it comes to keeping expenses under control, we are hoping for the best and planning for the worst," said Beauchamp. "There will be no pay raises or new positions other than those which are absolutely required."
In the final third of the evening, the main topic of discussion was the Health Center.
According to several students in the audience, the main problem they have with the Health Center is that appointments are hard to come by and the fact that the Health Center is closed on the weekends.
Beauchamp directed this question to John Goldrick, vice president for Enrollment Management and Student Life, whose job includes overseeing the Health Center.
"We are an institution which has an institution that provides health services. We are not Kaiser Permanente," Goldrick said. "It's a burden that would have to be shouldered by tuition and if we expanded our operations that would cause a huge increase in tuition."
According to Goldrick, the cost of staffing the Health Center for weekends and the cost of hiring a larger staff would be astronomical.
However, this did not stop students from voicing their opinions that something needs to be done about the Health Center.
"The Health Center is always an issue and the administration isn't going to just assume that there's a problem. They won't know until someone says something to them," Dorwart said. "I think bringing up the Health Center was a great thing."
Beauchamp ended the evening by reminding the students that he wants to hear from them.
"No question is out of bounds. No question is not a good question," Beauchamp said. "I have a policy of answering e-mails."
