Future of Queen’s Centre Phases I and II still uncertain
There’s still no word as to how Queen’s is to proceed with the next stage of the Queen’s Centre after last Friday’s Board of Trustees meeting.
Student trustee and AMS president-elect, Michael Ceci said the board is still waiting to hear how the recently announced $2 billion federal infrastructure funding towards universities will be allocated.
“It’s just a question of what’s coming next. Whether it be, the new student life centre, the field house or if they get money for deferred maintenance, the JDUC renovation,” he said. “We just don’t know, A, how much of the slice of that pie Queen’s will be getting and, B, whether that needs to be targeted to something specific, or if it can go to where the University sees fit.”
The AMS recently unanimously passed a motion at Assembly to recommend the construction of the student life centre in the second phase of the project over a plan to build the proposed field house.
“It’s just simply due to the fact that the recession’s hit, so there is not a lot of money or ability to borrow for the university at this time to continue. It’s more that they’re relying on this recession relief money,” Ceci said. “Hopefully, we’ll have more knowledge about the end of March, beginning of April.”
Phase 1 of the project is still scheduled to be finished on schedule, with the opening slated for Sept. 1. The School of Kinesiology is set to be completed by January 2010.
Ceci said he understands the inconvenient nature of this delay.
“It’s frustrating for all parties. Especially, for the AMS, we’re trying to figure out how to plan our operations for next year. What services will we to be able to have? Can we plan for Alfie’s to be open for just one more year, or for five more years? How’s that going to work? Certainly, people want to know, but we can’t really know at this point.”
—Emily Davies
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