Funds expand and upgrade CSUCI campus
By Daniel Wolowicz camarillo@theacorn.com

Jillian Mackey, 18, browsed the new bookstore at California State University Channel Islands with her family during a recent visit from her hometown of Heidelberg, Germany.

Mackey, whose father is a teacher for the Department of Defense at Heidelberg's U.S. Army base, will be one of more than 500 freshmen to begin classes next week on the Camarillo campus.

Mackey visited the university for the first time during her freshman orientation and said she likes the everevolving campus nestled below the Conejo Grade. "It's not too big, not too small," Mackey said. "I like that it's growing."

Part of that growth is the new 6,300-square-foot bookstore, which opened earlier this summer. Racks of T-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, shorts and all other types of clothing adorned with the CSUCI block lettering stretch throughout the spacious shop.

Fah Azarmsa, the store's manager, said parents and students alike are impressed with the new store, now stocked with everything from textbooks to the latest in dorm decor.

"They absolutely love it," Azarmsa said. "They come in and it wows everyone."

Azarmsa said the new store has become a gathering point at the university and expects to be busy with incoming students once classes start on Aug. 27.

The bookstore, which more than doubles the size of the original location, is part of a mixed-used development at the east end of the campus called Town Center.

Completed in April, the development includes four three-story buildings with more than 30,000 square feet of commercial space at ground level and 58 apartments on the two floors above.

Erik Blaine, executive director of the University Glen Corp., the property management arm of the university, said the bookstore, along with a convenience store, will neighbor three restaurants serving Mexican, Chinese and American cuisine.

The development, Blaine said, also will feature a handful of yettobenamed smaller retail shops.

The Town Center is just one of the many changes students will find when they arrive on the campus that has nearly $150 million in projects either in the planning or building stage.

A lion's share of that money is divided between two projects- a campuswide plan to upgrade the university's infrastructure and construction of the 173,000square-foot John Spoor Broome Digital Teaching Library.

Deborah Wylie, associate vice president of operation, planning and construction, said construction of the $60-million library is on time and on budget.

She said most of the library's major construction will be done by January 2008 and the university plans to host a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Sir Norman Fosterdesigned, glassencased building on April 4, 2008.

In addition to the new library, Wylie and other university officials are busy with a $62million plan to upgrade the campus' aging buildings.

Funded by state money through Proposition 1D, the plan, Wylie said, is critical in transforming the former state hospital built in the 1930s into a 21stcentury university expected to accommodate 15,000 students by 2025.

"The infrastructure upgrades to the 70-year-old campus are absolutely essential for the continued expansion of the university," Wylie said. "To be able to implement future academic buildings we need the power, the telecom and all the utilities upgraded."

Of the $62 million, nearly $50 million will be spent to wire the university with increased electrical capacity, improve the sewer and water systems, upgrade phone lines and build a new central heating and cooling system for the campus.

According to university officials, the infrastructure improvements are underway and expected for completion by fall 2010.

To house the growing student population, construction crews are putting the final touches on a $28-million student dorm on the west end of the campus. The campus, Wylie said, now has more than 800 beds for students and can expand to more than 1,000 if needed.

She said retrofitting the older buildings to accommodate student housing is a challenge- namely the lack of electrical wiring- but university officials expected certain challenges during the remodel.

"It's challenging, but there are no surprises because we've renovated so many buildings," Wylie said.

Ongoing improvements for the university campus also include a new parking lot, a renovated student union and a larger student commissary.