AMES – The Seashore Hall complex which houses the University of Iowa’s psychology department will not receive state funding for renovations until at least 2016, following a decision by Iowa state Board of Regents members Tuesday.

At a property and facilities committee meeting, board members agreed to hold off on recommending putting $9 million in the upcoming fiscal year to begin the project. The total cost of the years-long renovation and modernization psychology department infrastructure is estimated at $94.5 million, which includes the cost of a newly planned psychology building.

Psychology represents the largest department within UI’s largest college — Liberal Arts and Sciences — with roughly 1,300 declared undergraduate majors. A total of more than 4,300 students received more than 23,000 credit hours of undergraduate of psychology instruction last year.

Committee chairman Milt Dakovich said he wants the regents to wait until more information is available from an efficiency study being led by Deloitte Consulting before advancing projects.

“While we’re obviously not done (with the study), the things that we’ve talked about are very serious considerations to space utilization,” Dakovich said. “If you’re just going to upgrade what you have because it’s broken and old, then there’s a very small chance that that is going to be the right answer down the road someplace.”

The decision also impacted funding requests for a “Student Innovation Center” and renovations to the Industrial Technology Center at University of Northern Iowa.

Seashore Hall was built in 1899, with two additional wings built through 1915. The building originally was a hospital.

Rod Lehnertz, UI director of planning and construction, said many of the original spaces are now vacant and unusable for various reasons including safety regulations. In 1928, the UI hospitals moved to its current location, prompting to use the space for miscellaneous purposes until the psychology and other social science departments began using the space in 1947.

“It’s virtually unchanged since its construction more than 100 years ago,” Lehnertz said. “And key to what we have seen in the transformation of today’s students, (there are) no gathering spaces or teaming spaces to allow students to do anything other then get to and from classes in these rooms that were ill-fitted and certainly not designed for classrooms.”

Lehnertz also said the building has antiquated climate control with more than 150 AC units cooling the entire building.

“Which is wasteful, noisy and certainly a maintenance concern year after year,” Lehnertz said.

A recent evaluation of university infrastructure by the ISES Corporation, a facilities management firm based in Georgia, gave Seashore Hall the worst rating on the UI campus with a .59. Anything above .60 is recommended for replacement.

“So this reaches to the very top of that conditions report,” Lehnertz said.

Board member Bob Downer of Iowa City said the facility is in bad need of renovation but, “at the same time, I understand the point about efficiency and the utilization of facilities that we have on the campuses and possibly looking at alternative methods of delivery education.”

“My personal view from what I know of all of these facilities,” Downer said, “is that the case can be made for them to move forward, but I think it’s totally appropriate for the committee to take the stance it did.”

In response to questions about the value of renovation versus new construction, Lehnertz pointed to the construction of the new school of music building, which despite laying “almost vacant” for years, still had part of its original infrastructure utilized.

“The investment for modernizing that building, for a building that fits ideally for the program that’s hosted in that building, was a very wise investment on behalf of the state and the university,” Lehnertz said. “That’s the kind of thoughtful care we’re going to put into the evaluation of existing square footage in that building.”

Lehnertz said planning will continue for a new psychology building to be built independent of specific state funds. The psychology building was approved more than a year ago as part of the university’s five-year plan.

Reach Chase Castle at ccastle@press-citizen.com or 887-5412.

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