Graduate students made several recommendations about the proposed new recreational facility at a meeting of the Graduate and Professional Student Council Monday night.
GPSC will send the recommendations to the President's Advisory Council on Resources, which will soon decide whether to recommend to the President to submit the plans for the new gymnasium to the Board of Trustees. The Board meets in October.
The estimated cost of the building is $25 million, said Mark Uyeda, a second-year law student and GPSC representative to PACOR. The committee is considering requiring all undergraduate and graduate students to pay a yearly fee of about $228 to help fund the facility, Uyeda said.
However, many members of GPSC felt that the location of the building would naturally favor its use by undergraduates. The gym is supposed to be built on West Campus, where it would be within walking distance of a large number of undergraduates but few graduate students.
"This would be a bargain compared to Metrosport, but Metrosport is a lot more accessible to a great number of graduate students," Uyeda said.
GPSC voted to send several recommendations to PACOR. They recommend that graduate students be allowed to "opt out" of paying the fee if they choose not to use the gym, or for PACOR to make the fee higher for undergraduates than for graduate students.
"We do not believe or suggest that graduate students should receive preferential treatment," Uyeda said. "It's just that we have different circumstances than undergraduates that should be taken into account."
The graduate students also voted to request that construction of the building be postponed until about half of the construction money has been raised.
"It would be very irresponsible to go ahead and build this now when the Levine Science Research Center isn't even paid for yet," said Seth Watkins, a graduate student in mechanical engineering.
IN OTHER BUSINESS: Members of GPSC approved its budget for the 1993-1994 academic year. Totaling $14,156, the budget is almost identical to last year's budget, except one employee has been hired to "take care of clerical work," said Michael Eng, a third-year medical student.
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