By Jeremy Logan,
With a weight room resembling that of a prison yard, a crammed fitness center with lines to use an elliptical machine, empty, sweat stained couches pushed off into a dark corner, and pale lit locker rooms that make you feel like you are doing time, the student government at SFCC believes it is time for a revamp of the old gym.
On Thursday Feb. 27, the ASG voted to approve a resolution asking the board of trustees to impose a ‘per credit’ fee, which would pay for a total, or partial remodel of the current gymnasium.
“They [the ASG] authorized a per credit fee of $6.50 to $8.60 depending on whether the building gets totally redone, or whether they break it up into phases,” said Janet Gullickson, President at SFCC. “If it’s 2 phases it will be the lesser charge. If they go ahead and do the whole building it will be the larger charge.”
Phase one of building would bring things up to code while keeping things mostly the same. Phase two of building would see a total remodel of the entire gymnasium including a juice bar and climbing wall.
“The difference between phase one and phase two is that phase one is about $14.5 million but none of the locker rooms are changed, and it’s a pretty scaled down version,” Gullickson said. “The other one is about $19.5 million and the whole thing gets done. If we do both phases we will have more room for more classes, so we are hoping for that. If we do just the one phase, I am not sure we will have a lot more classes.”
Another part of the issues with the current facility is its accessibility for people in wheel chairs. There was an incident last year with one of the team’s coaches being unable to get to the gymnasium floor.
“I just get kind of choked up about it when I talk about this,” Gullickson said. “But last year we had a coach in a wheelchair who had to be carried down by his team to coach from the floor of the gymnasium. The students feel that they don’t want that to happen again. They liked to use wellness as a legacy, the idea that we come out healthier than when we come in. I am just very impressed with our students.”
The reason the burden of paying for the new gymnasium falls on the currently enrolled students, has to do with state legislating and where state funds are allowed to be used.
“The state of Washington does not allow legislatively appropriated funds to be used for things like rebuilding athletic facilities or gymnasiums,” Gullickson said. “The reason they don’t, in part, is that many of the universities have strong alumni connections, and that allows them to fundraise and build these facilities without any [state] funds, but we don’t have huge athletic programs. We have very good athletic programs, but we don’t have a huge one.”
In the process of developing an idea of what the new gym could look like, 1,000 students were asked what they would like to see in a new facility.
“The thing they wanted most was more access to the health and fitness facility, so we are going to expand the hours and expand the space,” said Gullickson. “Also right now the students that aren’t taking a class are paying a pretty hefty price, and so our athletic program has agreed to cap that off at $25 a quarter, so that would just pay for equipment replacement.”
According to Gullickson the second and third things on the list were a climbing wall and a place to gather and hang out, so they added a juice bar to the concept.
“They didn’t ask for a ton of stuff but the things they asked for would really improve the experience for students.” Gullickson said. “They are trying to create a main street feel to it, because right now it is kind of chopped up and the locker rooms kind of look like dungeons.”
Gullickson said she isn’t sure when they would start building but she presumes it would be by the end of the calendar year.
It would take about 18 months to build.