The University community is proud of our well-maintained, beautiful campus, virtually free of litter and graffiti. While life cycle maintenance guidelines suggest spending a minimum of 2.5% of estimated replacement costs on annual maintenance and repairs, over the past four years Millersville has spent between 3.3% and 4.7% annually.

Our students appreciate our attention to facilities. In a 1998 survey of college students conducted by the Higher Education Research Institute, for example, 67% of responding sophomores said they were satisfied with our laboratory facilities and equipment, compared to 54% of college students nationally.

As a public institution, Millersville's facilities have historically been funded through state capital appropriations. These appropriations have rarely, if ever, kept up with our needs for facilities. Capital appropriation decisions are made politically, with all Commonwealth project needs competing for limited and inconsistent pools of bond funds. Municipal, school district, and prison needs are typically given higher priority than public higher education.

During the 1990s, however, the situation improved dramatically. Thanks to Operation Jump Start and the capital campaign, six facilities have been constructed or renovated. McCollough Communication Complex, consisting of Hash Building and Bassler Hall, was renovated and expanded in 1999 and is now a state-of-the-art facility for our communication and broadcasting students. An 83,516-square-foot Science & Technology Building adjoining Roddy Science Center was constructed in 1999. The auditorium within the facility known as Alumni Hall and Lyte Auditorium was renovated into a modern performance hall in 1992. The former bookstore was renovated into Chryst Hall, home for our English composition courses, in 1994. Brossman Hall, a 9,741-square-foot facility supporting our science programs, was constructed in 1992. And Myers Auditorium, a lecture hall in McComsey Hall, was renovated in 1991 into a modern facility with electronic support for lectures and presentations.

Six other major facilities have been constructed or improved in the last few years. The Inn at Millersville, a Best Western affiliate, was constructed next to campus in 1996 by a private for-profit corporation established by the University. The Student Memorial Center was renovated and expanded in 1991 through funding from student fees (see Chapter 5). Lyle Student Services Building, a former residence hall, was renovated through bond financing in 1995 into a "one stop shopping" facility for services to students, including Admissions, the Registrar's Office, Financial Aid, Academic Advisement, Career Services, and the Center for Counseling and Human Development, among others. Using dining revenues, Lyle Dining Hall and Gordinier Dining and Conference Center were renovated and expanded in 1998 and 1999, respectively, to better meet the needs of students, employees, and those using the conference facilities. And Wickersham Hall, home of the Mathematics and Computer Science departments, was improved in 1998 with capital funds.

Upcoming Facilities Improvements: The Academic Facilities Renovation Plan

The success of Operation Jump Start stimulated a more extensive shared funding collaboration between the State System and the Governor. Under the Academic Facilities Renovation Plan, more academic facilities will be constructed and renovated through a combination of state capital funds, State System bond issues, and University commitments to retire the bonds through their own revenue streams. Renovations to Roddy Science Center, McComsey Hall, and Osburn Hall, all part of our upcoming focused campaign, are included in this plan, as is Stayer Education Center, home of most of our teacher education programs. Unfortunately, the plan's funds are insufficient to properly renovate these facilities. Our campaign will seek funds for technology infrastructure, a sizable, critical, and costly component of any facility that is not funded under current State System guidelines, and other necessary but unfunded improvements.

A New Capital Facilities Master Plan

As we have shown, during the ten-year period from the mid-1990s through roughly 2005, 17 facilities have been or will be constructed or renovated. This flurry of improvements has made this an opportune time to revisit our 30-year-old capital facilities master plan. Coincidentally, in 1995 the Board of Governors required every State System university to develop a new master plan. H2L2 Architects/Planners was retained in 1997 to assist us. The process was overseen by a broadly-representative steering committee and included wide consultation with students, employees, municipal officials, alumni, businesses, benefactors and friends.

The new master plan (Appendix 11-1) makes the campus more pedestrian-friendly and encourages faculty-student interaction by closing some roads, creating plazas and quadrangles, and moving some traffic to the campus perimeter. It creates a modern performing arts complex to support our music and theatre programs as well as cultural events. It creates a new athletics zone with a large sports education facility and new fields. And it increases the diversity of housing options for our students.

The estimated cost of fully implementing the plan is approximately $77 million. Except for the projects funded through the Academic Facilities Renovation Plan and the new focused campaign discussed above, all proposed improvements are currently unfunded. The Commonwealth's 1999-2000 capital appropriation bill, signed by the Governor, approves campus infrastructure improvements plus three other projects: the performing arts complex, the sports education facility, and renovations to our maintenance buildings. The bill does not fund these projects, however, and their funding remains highly uncertain.