Joann Groff
News Editor
Ben Young / Photo Editor
A battle has begun, and the sides are slightly unbalanced: more than 3,000 versus nearly 80. There are about 100 parking spaces available to faculty and staff in the parking lot in front of the CCB, and they will most likely soon be up for grabs.
“If everyone thinks this is a good idea, I could see this happening before the end of the school year,” said Dr. Mark Davis, UMC member and dean of Student Affairs.
Some faculty in the Center for Communication and Business are displeased by the tentative plan to remove the island and gates from the entrance to the parking lot, a decision made by a subcommittee University Management Committee Monday.
Perhaps not surprisingly, students seem pleased with the chance at closer parking spots.
“I usually have to park in the Fieldhouse when I have class (in the CCB),” junior Mike Alahouzos said. “That would be awesome. I think they should reserve a number of spots for teachers, but there are not many people working there and it would make parking on the hill easier.”
Not only will more cars be traveling into the CCB lot, but Pepperdine’s people mover, the Shuttle, will now transcend the gap between the CCB and the rest of campus. The route will be altered, cutting out the stop at Seaver and President’s Drive and adding a drop off at the front doors of the CCB.
Dr. Bob Chandler, chair of the Communication Division, said the change is intended to reduce some of the pedestrian traffic at that intersection.
“… We will want to learn the thinking of the UMC subcommittee in the coming weeks, and will want to offer suggestions to make this new plan work as well as possible,” Chandler wrote in an e-mail he sent to his colleagues in the building. “I have corresponded with the Provost and have expressed some concerns that I have about this decision and the process by which it was reached.”
Many communication and business faculty and staff members expressed confusion and dissatisfaction with the new plan.
Esther O’Connor, office manager of the Communication Division, said she is not pleased with the decision.
“I am not happy about it,” O’Connor said. “I don’t have a problem with students parking, I just don’t think opening up a division lot for that purpose is going to help.
“We don’t live on campus; we are commuting and running errands on campus,” she added. “So now every time we leave, we have to find a spot?”
Chandler said “the UMC plan is to designate (restrict) a certain number of spaces for ‘faculty/staff only’ use” and that particular amount is still to be determined.
Dr. Ken Waters, professor of Communication, said he expects the committee to discuss the proposed changes with people who work in the building.
“Any Pepperdine committee who wants the respect of their employees should talk to their employees before making a decision like this,” Waters said.
He said he expects the committee to provide them with a study that proves this is a good idea, as would be his expectation of any good management. Chandler also mentioned that the committee would be conducting some studies.
“If they don’t want to do that than I may need to discuss with some of my fellow professors how we are going to have class … and what’s more important, having class or parking in an approved parking spot — we may just need to park on the lawn.”
O’Connor said there are other options.
“Why didn’t they have to open the lot on main campus, or by the tower? Now faculty are going to be just as inconvenienced as students,” said O’Connor, who stressed concern for adjuncts who come from an hour or more away after leaving their full-time jobs.
“There has to be another solution,” she said, offering an idea to gate off half of the parking lot.
Many faculty members who work in the CCB say the have heard the gates will be torn down, or at least opened, very soon. But Chandler said he has not been given a timetable.
He said that if anyone has concerns, there is a division meeting next week and he would be happy discuss it. Aside from that, there are no plans for an organized response or complaint.
“No one thinks this is our parking lot, it’s the university’s,” Chandler said. “If they ask us our opinion, we’ll be delighted to give it.
11-11-2004