The state legislature has opened its purse to provide $35.1 million for a new bioscience building to benefit the nursing and biology programs at the Purdue Northwest Hammond campus.
More Top Picks Steelseries Arctis Nova 1
The new building will be built at the north end of the parking lot on 173rd Street next to the Student Union and Library Building and Lawshe Hall. It will include instructional and research laboratories for the nursing and biology programs.
“It will put a direct emphasis on nursing and biology. Both areas will be key to the future of Purdue Northwest,” said Chancellor Thomas L. Keon. “Nursing is already a very very strong program. We have a large biology program and high-quality biology (programs) on both campuses. From a faculty perspective, everyone will have an opportunity to enjoy these research facilities. There will be laboratories for faculty members in addition to the instructional laboratories.”
According to Keon, the next step will be to go through the formal process to hire an architectural firm and a construction company. The two will be selected at the same time. Keon said this will help formulate realistic designs to stay on budget.
The total cost of the project will be closer to $40 million including the recently approved $35.1 million and $2.4 million in planning funds approved earlier. An additional $3 million will sought from donors, he said.
As part of the project, Purdue Northwest will also demolish Gyte Annex. The annex, built in 1950 as the Industrial Research Building for Inland Steel Corp., was deemed unworthy of renovation in 1997.
“The building is almost non-functional,” said Keon. “The nursing labs flooded last year and we took a portion of the library for temporary nursing labs.”
It took 15 years for the new building project to make its way to the top of the list for funding. Keon credits State Rep. Hal Slager, R-Schererville, and a majority member of the Ways and Means Committee with pushing it over the top.
“Hal Slager worked very hard for us,” said Keon.
“(Gyte Annex) is in really poor condition. It didn’t make sense to renovate that old structure,” said Slager. “This particular campus, they have turned it around from a community college to a four-year university. It didn’t make sense to wait any longer, because the construction costs keep going up. It was important to convey all that (to the legislators) so that they didn’t understand it to be simply another new building. Everybody wants a new building.”
Nancy Coltun Webster is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.