Thursday, March 28, 2024

Board of Trustees approves room and board rate increase

April 12, 2013

At Friday morning’s Board of Trustees meeting, the trustees unanimously approved a 3.9 percent room and board rate increase, construction of a new Bio Engineering Facility and a 25-megawatt electrical duct bank to help power the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams, or FRIB.

The room and board rates will add $330 onto the standard silver unlimited meal plan rate, which now will cost $8,806 for the 2013-14 academic year. This is the lowest increase in 13 years.

“We needed to do it — we have to maintain the quality for the students who are here and it costs money and we’re still lower than (almost) everyone else,” Trustee Joel Ferguson said after the meeting.

MSU’s room and board rates are the ninth-lowest in the Big Ten Conference.

Because of many dining and residence hall renovations, Residential and Hospitality Services, or RHS, has accumulated $216 million in debt service costs since 2000.

The student rate increase is aimed to help alleviate this debt and maintain operational costs, Director of Residence Education and Housing Services Kathy Collins after the meeting.

During the meeting, she said there will be no rate increases to the Spartan Village and University Village apartments, in order to stay competitive with prices for off-campus apartments.

After the meeting, Residence Halls Association President Zachary DeRade said although rate increases are unpleasant, he is happy the increase is as small as it can be.

“We understand that with our youngest building being — I think 46 years old is how old our youngest residence hall (is) — that there’s going to come a time that we do have to have those renovations,” he said.

The Bio Engineering Facility, costing $60.8 million, is located among the Life Science and Clinical Center buildings in south campus off of Service Rd. Construction is slated to commence in July 2013, with substantial completion by August 2015 and full completion by November 2015.

The facility is aimed to increase research initiatives in bio-engineering and engineering health sciences at MSU.

During the meeting, Vice President for Administrative Services Satish Udpa, who is the former dean of the College of Engineering, said this building will service the collaboration of many different research areas, faculty and students from various colleges, including the College of Human Medicine, the College of Natural Science, the College of Engineering and the College of Arts and Letters.

“I’m hoping that we are going to be able to attract all of these people and they are going to be able to work together on some of these interesting directions,” he said after the meeting.

The FRIB’s 25-megawatt electrical duct bank will deliver power to FRIB from the T.B. Simon Power Plant.

The duct bank will house the electrical cables stretching from just west of the power plant, and extend to the northwest corner of the Wilson Rd. and Bogue St. intersection.

The $26 million duct bank’s construction is set to begin in May 2013, with substantial completion set for September 2016 and full completion in December 2016.

In President Barack Obama’s fiscal year 2014 budget proposal submitted Wednesday, $55 million was allocated for FRIB — pleasing MSU and FRIB project leaders.

Construction on FRIB could begin this summer, finishing in 2019 if the amount is adopted by Congress.

The U.S. Department of Energy then will need to approve FRIB’s construction. The project will be reviewed in June.

“(FRIB) is a national priority and it reflects the fact that we need to, as a nation, sustain science preeminence,” MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon said after the meeting. “It’s key to international competitiveness, and FRIB falls into that category.”

Support student media! Please consider donating to The State News and help fund the future of journalism.

Discussion

Share and discuss “Board of Trustees approves room and board rate increase” on social media.