A subcommittee of the Tennessee Board of Regents voted today to freeze a matching program that allows schools to raise private dollars for building projects. But school’s that have already started the fundraising will be given until December to meet their match.
The program has ruffled the feathers of college presidents like George Van Allen of Nashville State Community College. The school has had a 24-million dollar classroom facility on the wish-list since 1998. Van Allen says the project has no private money, so schools with matching funds get to move ahead.
“The prospect of 5, 6 or 7 projects advancing before us will push our next building back, I’m guessing, 10 to 15 years.”
Nashville State will finish a 19-million dollar classroom and student services building this fall. But the last time a building was completed on campus was 20 years ago, when enrollment was half what it is now.
Southwest Tennessee Community College in Memphis is the only school to successfully raise enough matching funds. Its 15-million dollar nursing and biotech facility was added to the capital list in 2007, but now it moves ahead of Nashville State’s project.
TBR officials say the perception that the matching program is unfair led to talk of suspending it. The full Board of Regents will vote later this month.
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