About half the space—3.9 million square feet—is more than 30 years old. A relatively small portion—1.4 million gross square feet, or about 17 percent—is new within the past decade.

At this time, Temple does not have firm estimates of the current replacement value (CRV) of our facilities. A preliminary estimate puts that number at $1.6 billion. One of our first tasks must be to clearly define the current replacement value, so that we can make assessments of how much we should be spending annually to maintain the condition of our facilities.

Similarly, Temple does not presently have building condition statements for each of its buildings. That is, we do not have a thorough assessment of the condition of the structures, mechanical systems, and other components of the buildings. Such evaluations take time, and they are expensive. They are also essential to effective facilities planning over a period of years. In the next fiscal year we will begin to develop building condition statements, and I hope we can complete this process within four years.

Maintaining Temple's Facilities
As a rule of thumb a university should annually spend a minimum of 2 percent of the current replacement value (CRV) of its buildings for major repairs and renovations that renew the life of the building. This calculation assumes that university buildings have a long life span of 50 years and that by investing 2 percent per year, buildings are constantly maintained in reasonably current condition. Today's highly sensitive mechanical systems, especially in science and arts facilities, and the extensive information technology infrastructure now embedded in university buildings make a 50-year life estimate quite generous. Most universities stay with the 2 percent formula because using a shorter life span for buildings would make the required annual financial commitment impossible.

Assuming that the current replacement value of Temple's buildings is $1.6 billion, the University should be committing $32 million annually to major renovations and renewal. Our present methods of allocating and accounting for funds have not sufficiently distinguished between ordinary operation and repair costs, on the one hand, and renovation and renewal expenditures, on the other. As a result, we have not given sufficient emphasis to the need for renovation and renewal. My initial impression is that we have fallen quite short of the necessary level of investment for these purposes.

If these assumptions are correct—and both the annual expenditure and current replacement value estimates require considerable review—Temple has significant deferred maintenance. This would be consistent with the concerns expressed by some faculty about the condition of classrooms and laboratories. A separate appraisal by my external consultant on our research programs rates our laboratory facilities from acceptable to inadequate.

As we begin a process of fully evaluating the condition of Temple's facilities, we should assume that we have a significant deferred maintenance gap to close. In addition, we should make every effort to begin to increase the facilities budget in steps to establish renewal and renovation funding of 2 percent of CRV. Since Temple's base budget is already heavily committed and many in the University feel urgent needs in other areas of our endeavor, increasing the budget for renovation and major repairs will create some stresses over a period of years until the base budget for facilities has reached the targeted amount. At the same time, there will be substantial opportunities for the University and for the deans of the respective colleges to undertake private fund raising from alumni and friends of the University for upgrading facilities. Indeed, in many universities a substantial portion of such funds must be raised privately, with the University matching to some degree private giving for facilities renewal. As Temple strengthens its fund-raising program, we should consider moving in the same direction.

Facilities Initiatives to Meet Changing Needs
As mentioned earlier, Temple has greatly expanded its leased space in Harrisburg and Center City Philadelphia to expand its instructional programs to non-traditional students.

Three kinds of additional initiatives must be considered over the next five years.

Student Housing
Temple faces an urgent need for student housing. In the current academic year, more than 3,000 students live on campus. With the opening of a major dormitory under construction at the south end of campus, more than 4,000 students will live in Temple dormitories next year. In the current year, more than 700 students are housed in leased space away from the University area and provided regular bus service to and from the main campus because there is inadequate campus housing to meet demand. Many additional students live in rental units on side streets around the campus. Preference for University housing is given to freshmen and sophomores. If enrollment growth continues, as seems likely, Temple will need additional dormitory facilities to accommodate its freshmen and sophomores.

In addition, as Temple's recent, larger entering classes become juniors and seniors, many will want to remain in the University area. Some graduate and professional students also live in the area, and more may do so as a vibrant Templetown develops in North Philadelphia. For years students from Temple and other area universities had the option to live in affordable and available housing in Center City. With the revitalization of Center City, vacancy rates there have become small and rents have become high. There is now increasing pressure for Temple students to find housing in the main campus area. Upperclassmen are likely to prefer apartment living to dormitories. Consequently, a major University initiative must be to work with private developers to encourage the construction of appropriate rental apartments in the main campus area. If private developers cannot fully meet the need for student housing, the University itself must expand its housing program to provide the necessary residential space for upperclassmen and for graduate and professional students.

Private development of housing in the area must be done with private funds without University subsidy. University housing should continue to be built as fully as possible on a self-financing basis, as it has been in the past.

If the Tyler School of Art moves to the main campus (see discussion below), additional dormitory and apartment space will be needed to replace that presently available to Tyler students in Elkins Park.

Educational Facilities
Temple has substantial needs for specialized instructional facilities. The requests for new space far outdistance any reasonable estimate of the University's financial ability to provide these facilities. A small number of the requests are compelling. The University should focus on these projects for the next five years.

In summary, Temple's immediate plans should include as many of the following as possible:

• The Learning Center at Ambler College. Long in planning, the Ambler Learning Center must provide suitable classrooms to replace deteriorated temporary facilities, a technology center for student learning, and a small amount of additional academic support space. With 3,500 student enrollments, Ambler is now a large part of Temple's educational program and its prospects for additional enrollment growth are strong. The University has a responsibility to expand and improve the instructional facilities at Ambler to serve Temple's students there.

• The Tyler School of Art. This eminent institution—one of the leading art schools in the nation—is now seriously overcrowded and housed in facilities that do not meet either technology or environmental requirements for modern arts programs. After extensive discussion, there is strong sentiment for Tyler to be relocated to new facilities at the main campus. This will require cooperation from the City of Philadelphia and the neighborhood around the University. If the relocation of Tyler is not acceptable to our neighbors and our municipal leaders, an alternative must be sought either at Tyler's present site in Elkins Park or elsewhere. The University, the community, and the City would all benefit by having an eminent arts program at the main campus in North Philadelphia. The arts faculty have emphasized the need both for a signature building architecturally and a functional building for the studios, laboratories, classrooms, offices, and exhibition spaces that are required to retain Tyler's eminence.

• Health Sciences Learning Center. The Temple Medical School is expanding its enrollment to help meet the rising demand for physicians. Other health programs located at the Health Sciences Center also need access to advanced information technology facilities. Some funds have already been set aside for a Learning Center at the health sciences campus. A few additional classrooms fully equipped with modern instructional technology are needed and should also be part of this initiative. The University should make an additional commitment of funds, and the Medical School may reasonably be expected to conduct a significant capital campaign.

• Temple has made a commitment to construct a facility at the south end of the Liacouras Center parking facility, facing Cecil B. Moore Avenue. This structure would house WRTI-FM, new television studios to be used for teaching and, if possible, for the redevelopment of a Temple television broadcast station, and a community education center. This community education center was promised to our neighbors at the time the Liacouras Center was constructed, and our continuing failure to fulfill our commitment is troubling. This same facility could also house commercial space facing Cecil B. Moore Avenue if an anchor tenant can be found.

• The Fox School of Business and Management has enjoyed substantial enrollment growth and impressive gains in the quality of its programs and its national stature. Some expansion of the Fox School has been planned. However, this expansion will depend on addressing difficult site problems, assuring that additional business school facilities will not be at the expense of precious classroom space for campus-wide undergraduate programs, and conducting a substantial capital campaign to match University funds.

• A smaller but important challenge is to provide suitable off-site compact storage for those parts of Temple's library collection that are not in current use but must remain available for research. At the present time, scholars who need older research materials that are not on library shelves and not available on-line have difficulty obtaining those materials, even if we own them, because they are stored inaccessibly. As we plan other facilities we should be looking for opportunities to incorporate special off-site library storage facilities within those new buildings.

• Although there are no plans presently in place to restore or use the Baptist Temple at Broad Street and Berks Mall, this historically important and aesthetically fine building should be carefully studied both for potential University uses and for historic preservation. Faculty in the Boyer College of Music have suggested that it could provide them a much needed performance hall on the main campus, diminishing the need to offer Boyer performances at off-site, often remote, locations not easily accessible to the general student body. Recognition of the building's importance and deteriorating condition must be part of Temple's planning.

• As the number of students living on and around the main campus grows, it is urgent for Temple to restore suitable entertainment and social spaces that have recently been lost, including lounge space, meeting rooms, a TV lounge, the cinema, and large all-purpose space. An expansion of the Student Activities Center to improve the quality of student life is imperative and urgent.

Laboratory Renovation
Consistent with a renewed University effort to become more competitive nationally in the science-based disciplines, including those in the Health Sciences Center, it will be necessary to make substantial commitments to renovation of Temple's laboratories, replacement of scientific equipment, and improvement of our animal facilities.

The renovation of laboratories should proceed in steps. Presently only a few of our laboratories can be characterized as being state-of-the-art facilities in excellent condition. A few more can be thought of as being in good condition. But far too many are in marginal or poor shape. Because the accumulated deterioration of our laboratories is so great, it seems likely that we will be compelled to upgrade scientific facilities in stages. I think it unlikely that we will be able to close entire laboratory buildings for overhaul or to construct entirely new laboratory facilities. We do not have the funds for such massive undertakings nor do we have surplus space that would allow us to relocate teaching and research activities on a large scale to other facilities.

Our approach is therefore likely to be incremental. We may focus on laboratory facilities in blocks or floor by floor. And it will be necessary for us to ask scientists without substantial research programs to vacate their labs to make room for student instruction and for the relocation of funded research activities. This will be a messy, inconvenient, uneven, and controversial process. But it must be done.

We will seek operating appropriations from the State for laboratory renovation. But we must recognize that we will also be required to make substantial commitments—several million dollars at a time—in the operating budget to remediate our longstanding neglect of laboratories at Temple. Like a number of other urgent initiatives, this will require that we forego worthy endeavors elsewhere in the University. How we respond to this rigorous prioritization of campus issues will be a test of Temple's research prospects for decades to come.

Facilities Planning
The Steering Committee of the Faculty Senate has addressed a letter of concern to me about our facilities planning process. Their central point was that our facilities program would be more effective if faculty were more fully involved. I agree with their observation.

Our vice president with responsibility for facilities has been reviewing the facilities planning procedures of several other universities. He finds these procedures to be much more fully documented than Temple's and to include clearly identified opportunities for advice from facilities users. We expect to develop our own procedures that will broaden involvement in the facilities planning process.

Specifically, those affected by the construction of new buildings or the renovation of existing buildings should be given a full opportunity to participate in the development of program statements that will incorporate the features that will most effectively promote their teaching, research, and service programs. At a second stage, when a program statement is completed and design begins, they should have a further opportunity to comment on the design features of the facilities they will occupy. It must also be clear, however, that some desired features will be lost as program aspirations are fitted within the budgets allocated for the facilities. And once plans are fixed, there can be no further modifications, because these changes during the construction phase create significant cost overruns as well as delays in completion.

In addition, we would like each year to visit with an appropriate faculty committee about the proposed priorities for major renovation and repair throughout the campus. These are often driven by specific building conditions and cannot easily be changed. But faculty advice may help set priorities among those needed renovations that are not emergencies. We also should develop at Temple a network of building coordinators: persons in each building—an assistant dean, department chair, administrative officer—to whom the users of the building can report short-term repair needs. The broken door, failed plumbing, burned out lights, and other small matters that make a difference to our daily functioning and to the quality of our work environment ought to be able to be fixed promptly. But first they must be reported. A building coordinator in each campus building, with the responsibility to report these needs and the ability to follow up when response does not occur, should make the environment for our students and ourselves much more livable.

Finally, to assure the most effective use of space and to avoid unnecessary additional investment in facilities, the University must implement a much stronger space inventory and establish much stronger procedures for assigning space, including classroom space. Over the years the decentralization of control over space and space allocation has caused considerable space to be committed to uses that are low institution-wide priorities, even though they might be high priorities for particular units within the University. A complete space inventory, including the intended uses of space, is being compiled. A stronger, uniform policy on space allocation will soon be issued; and more intensive review of space scheduling and space uses will be undertaken. Some additional central management of space will be necessary to accommodate enrollment growth, to create "surge" space into which activities can be moved during renovations of existing facilities, and to assure that priority needs of all academic and student support programs are met as effectively as possible.

Temple as a Neighbor
Any discussion of Temple's expansion necessarily raises important questions about Temple's role as a neighbor in North Philadelphia. In some respects, Temple's presence strengthens the neighborhood. Temple's students, staff, and faculty are deeply engaged in service activities in the surrounding community. The growth of Temple's residential student body has placed more people on the streets, thus heightening safety, and has provided some economic support for fragile commercial enterprises. The Temple police are well known and widely respected for the community assistance and law enforcement activities they conduct in North Philadelphia. Temple's campus provides a space where neighbors can visit, stroll, and play. Activities at the University are open for participation by neighbors.

At the same time, the expansion of a large institution can disrupt the neighborhood. Traffic volume grows. Parking by Temple staff and students crowds neighborhood streets. And student night life is often incompatible with tranquility in the neighborhood, especially for older residents. Temple's growth is also worrisome to its neighbors: they may fear that the University will acquire and vacate residential properties, thus undermining stability in the neighborhood.

As Temple seeks to expand its facilities, it must do so in collaboration with its neighbors. Land acquisition should not disrupt existing residential patterns. It should avoid as fully as possible the relocation of any residents. Temple's uses of land should be compatible with the surrounding uses and should not become a burden on neighbors.

Temple can also play a constructive role in the neighborhood. The University already collaborates with community schools, and we should seek additional ways to do this. Stronger schools will make the neighborhood more attractive to potential residents as well as retaining those who already live here. Temple has had a strong program of training community people to participate in its construction programs. If Temple undertakes expansion of its facilities, these efforts should be continued and expanded.

Unfortunately, Temple is not a wealthy institution that can provide grants or subsidies from its own resources. But Temple could make greater efforts to provide technical and planning assistance to community organizations seeking government subsidies or private grants to restore or construct housing. This should be within Temple's means to do.

Most important, Temple should lay out its plans for the next five years and should then discuss them fully with the community both to seek support and to try to ameliorate any disruption that such plans may create among the University's neighbors. Openness and collaboration should be expected of Temple, and the University should meet those expectations.