McHenry County Blog

McHenry County College Facilty Master Plan Information provided by the college after the presentation:

Facility Master Plan Information – April 26, 2012

 

Rationale: Why MCC Should Pursue a Master Plan

• The development and planning for facilities now offers an opportunity to look to the future and acquire land in order to avoid examples of other community colleges that are currently land-locked.
• What comes first – space or excess demand? The surrounding community needs (and desires) a college that is change ready. MCC goals include the ability to implement programs—often as fast as six weeks—in order to support community members and businesses in training those who desire a career but many not require a full, four-year program, as well as continuing education or re-training needs. If the College waits for the demand, it will take too long to build the space needed, and student may likely enroll elsewhere. MCC needs to build the space first in order to be able to respond to community immediately.
• A master planning process organizes and plans out ways to ensure adequate space is in place to meet community needs and guarantee student success.
• This planning offers an opportunity to implement sustainable and long-term, energy-saving strategies in replacement of an aging infrastructure.

Projected Student Growth

• Based on MCC enrollment history, nationwide trends for a greater portion of the population enrolling in community colleges rather than traditional four-year universities and increased focus on career-training/adult-re-training, an average 3% annual rate of growth, expressed in full-time-equivalent (FTE) student enrollment, will be used for our projections.
• FTE is used by the Illinois Community College Board (ICCB) and is based on credit hours combined for all students, expressing the equivalent head count as if all students were full time.
• The following numbers reflect this projection, taking the 3% annual enrollment increase into account:
  • Current (2012): 4,100 FTE
  • 10 Years: 5,500 FTE
  • 20 Years: 7,400 FTE
  • 40 Years: 13,400 FTE

Projected Space Needs

• The current main campus facilities are undersized in comparison to peer community colleges (College of DuPage, College of Lake County, Elgin Community College, Harper College, Waubonsee Community College).
• Peer community colleges range from 85-169 gross square foot (GSF) per student (this range also includes Moraine Valley Community College).
• Currently, MCC has 97 GSF per student. After removing the peer community colleges with the highest and lowest GSF, MCC should be at 120-125 GSF per student today.
• A square footage reduction factor of 86.6% was used to lower the projected on-campus built space to accommodate for more on-line courses and programs taught off campus.
• MCC currently has a total of 398,000 GSF. This means that the College is currently short approximately 100,000 GSF, needing a total of 492,000 GSF right now. Here is what the minimum GSF needed will be in future years:
  • 10 Years: 574,000 GSF
  • 20 Years: 773,000 GSF
  • 40 Years: 1,399,000 GSF
• This is the minimum need, and MCC will need additional space to accommodate larger spaces that do not currently exist, such as auditoriums, theatres and larger, multi-purpose flexible space.

Projected Parking Needs

• MCC parking currently has 2,150 spaces. Based on student and space projections outlined above, here is how parking will be impacted in the future:
  • Need in 10 Years: 2,900 spaces
  • Need in 20 Years: 3,800 spaces
  • Need in 40 Years: 7,000 spaces
• Transportation options and needs may change in the future; one possibility is un-manned shuttles that would take people from remote parking lots/transportation to campus buildings.
• Parking garages are shown on the plan as an option to all surface lot parking.

Recommendations to Date

• Based on MCC Educational Master Plan and feedback from employee and trustee interviews, the College needs to blend enrollment-based space needs with program improvement/initiative needs.

• From extensive review of facilities and discussions with employees and students, space needs have been demonstrated in the following areas: Student Support Services; Health Careers, Math and Sciences; Technology and Career centers; multi-use classrooms for both academics and community events; Public Safety instruction; Fine Arts workspace; and multi-use large spaces.
• The recommended concept will provide visibility and transparency to the community by facing U.S. Highway 14.
• Maintain impervious land coverage to green space ratio under 50%. (Master Plan is at 40-42%).
• Students/employees/visitors should be able to walk anywhere on the main campus property within 10-20 minutes (this timeframe is in the same range for many high schools).

Budget Planning Information

• 10 yr -$278.5 M in 2013 dollars – land acquisition and owner soft costs not included
• 20 yr -$199.3 M in 2013 dollars – land acquisition and owner soft costs not included
• 40 yr -$162.1 M in 2013 dollars – land acquisition and owner soft costs not included

Contact Information

Wight & Company

Leanne Meyer-Smith, AIA, LEED AP BD +C

Senior Project Manager and Licensed Architect

(630) 969-7000
lmeyersmith@wightco.com

Eric Holder begins his introductory remarks to U.S. Justice Department web site readers with this statement:

“The primary mission of the United States Department of Justice is to do justice.

“Our only responsibility it to do the right thing.”

If Holder really believes that why has he not met the statutory deadline for issuing rape in prison regulations.

The deadline was June 23, 2010.

It’s almost two years later.

In June of 2009, proposed regulations were made public.

There was a comment period.

It’s long over.

The Washington City Newspaper had an article covering a Jue 23, 2010 press conference by Lovisa Stannow, Just Detention International (previously called Stop Prison Rape) Executive Director.

Naturally, she decried that day’s missed deadline.

It’s now almost two years later.

A former white collar criminal from a Colorado prison also spoke.

Let me show you the part about him:

“Scott Howard-Smith, a survivor of sexual abuse while incarcerated on theft and tax code violation charges, also shared his story on the call.

“‘The attacks that I suffered were devastating,’ said Howard-Smith, who detailed how a white supremacist gang in his Colorado prison ‘raped, assaulted, and extorted’ him in an attempt to convince him to commit fraud on their behalf.

“The abuse didn’t stop with fellow inmates.

“‘My efforts to report were often fruitless,’ Howard-Smith says.

“Corrections officers refused to help him unless he identified all of his assailants by name and detailed their illegal activities, a move Howard-Smith thought would have put him at greater risk in the facility.

“Other officials informed Howard-Smith that ‘as a homosexual I should expect to be targeted by one gang or another,’ while refusing to offer him added protections.”

(Virginia U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf seems to be the main pushing Holder. He and other need to push more.)

Another part of President Barack Obama’s administration, the U.S. Department of Education, did manage to promulgate regulations against sexual assault on college and university campus.

An Associated Press article on Sunday, May 22, 2012, reported on that.  (Can’t find the Sun-Times link, but here’s the one to the USA Today story.)

That version reports,

“…as Title IX is now interpreted…colleges must respond if a sexual assault is reported, even if prosecutors refuse to get involved.

“Moreover, they face often precise instructions from the government for conducting their investigations and proceedings, and even the standard of proof to use.”

Now, why would the Obama folks go after rape in college, but not in prison?

Could it be because college coeds can vote and most prisoners can’t?

“Vision” was the word that main presenter Leanne Meyer-Smith used to describe the $278.5 million (excluding “soft” and acquisition costs) proposal her firm developed for the McHenry County College Board.

As with most presentations of government “goods,” the cost didn’t come until after the benefits.

In fact, the cost figures were on the very last slide.

After 35 pages of attractive wish-fulfillments.

Wight Arhcitectural-Engineering-Constrution plans started with the current boundaries.

As a basis for projecting needs, the consultants guessed that enrollment would increase 3% per year for the next forty years and selected junior colleges for comparison, but eliminated what were called “outliers.”

While inflation of students was projected, monetary inflation was not. The $278 million dollars are 2013 dollars, even though they are for the first ten-years of the forty-year plan.

Morraine Valley Community College had fewer square feet per student than MCC (85 vs. 97 at MCC), but, since it was an “outlier,” it disappeared from the analysis.

Except when the Wight people want to show how a quadrangle arrangement of buildings could work.

Lake County had 124 square feet per student and was also eliminated as an “outlier.”

Left for comparison were colleges the lowest of which in square footage (College of DuPage) was 18.6% higher than MCC’s.; the largest square footage, at Harper, was 38% higher than McHenry County’s.

What little I remember of math was that assumptions always determined the solutions.

Start with a high base and you’ll end up with a high result.

With MCC now having 97 square feet per student, the number advanced by the consultants was “120-124 gross square feet per student.”

This, even though it was admitted that an increasing number of students were taking their courses online.

No where in the presentation was there any analysis of the utilization of current space, by the way. Nevertheless, faculty told the consultants, “There’s a space crunch everywhere you go.”

An image of the view from Route 14 was described as a necklace of buildings. Not mentioned is that there will be lakes along most of the distance.

A arched entryway is envisioned for the main entrance opposite Lucas Road.

And there will be lots of “quality outdoor space” in the center of the campus to encourage students to stay on campus.

A key element in the space calculation is needed parking.

For none of the other colleges used for comparison, however were such figures presented.

Pretty much every word available was used to appeal to environmentalists. There was even a photo of a windmill on one slide.

The argument was made that using permeable paving “at least at the front,” the three-stage water run-off system mandated by Crystal Lake Watershed Ordinance, electric car re-charging stations, etc., would allow the public and even builders to see what can be seen “no place [else]” locally.

I am sure the McHenry County Conservation District would be pleased to show off most of what was suggested at its Visitors Centerin Ringwood.

I have to admit that I don’t understand the logic for electric re-charging stations being taxpayer financed. Maybe that’s not what the consultants were suggesting. With natural gas prices where they are, ten years from now, there might well be more cars running on that fuel than electricity unless there are much better batteries in our future. And, if there are, what would be the need for re-charging stations?

Lots of trucks running on natural gas now, by the way. Not that I am suggesting MCC setting up a location to fill vehicle tanks.

Plenty of meetings were held over a nine-month period to obtain input, but most seem to have been in-house. Employees, of course, always want more space, better working conditions. They, however, want others to pay for such improvements.

The most significant outreach was to the McHenry County Council of Governments, which in my less polite moments, I would characterized as a trade association of taxeaters.

Under no characterization, however, could they be labeled taxpayer advocates. I say that waiting for any governing board to point out more than one year in which their boards did not take (or reserve for the taking in future years) the maximum amount possible from property taxpayers. (Most, including MCC, have always maximized the tax take from homeowners and businesses. Any corrections will made joyously.)

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