Phase II Housing plans dominated the discussion last Thursday night at the SGA Senate meeting.

Department of Housing Director Earl Wright told the SGA Senate that now that Phase I, University Village, has been completed, Phase II can get well underway.

Phase II Housing will be built where McCord Hall is currently located. While they are getting a late start in the demolition of McCord Hall due to the delays that took place in the construction of University Village, efforts to close down McCord Hall have begun with all students living in McCord being moved into a different building.

Workers are beginning to take items out of McCord that are to be salvaged for the other dorms’ use.

The demolition of McCord Hall was suppose to take place on March 26; however, because of delays this date is being pushed further back to a later date.

It will be a site to see when it all does come down. However, the demolition could be a disturbance. Once the demolition begins, the parking lanes in front of McCord will be blocked off.

“Bare with us when the demolition of McCord starts,” Wright asks the occupants of the university.

Since the first plans were made, the Department of Housing has wanted to provide the university and its students with quality housing that suits their needs.

“We spent a lot of time and effort trying to zero in on just what students were looking for,” Wright said.

He continued by saying that the students’ primary concern for housing was to have a private bedroom; therefore, this necessity was met in the plans for both University Village and Phase II Housing.

Phase II Housing will consist of four building. Three of the buildings will provide living arrangements for students. These buildings will have 392 beds. These rooms will vary with the number of occupants in each room. Students can request to have a one, two, three or four-bedroom apartment.

The fourth building will be the Commons Building. A kitchen, game room and conference rooms are among some of the rooms present in the Commons Building.

While people who live in Phase II Housing will have the priority to host events here, the Commons Building will be utilized as needed for the campus. The large conference room could even be used to host some of the university’s classes.

Because the cost of materials has increased due to Hurricane Katrina and the hurricanes that took place in Florida, the building of Phase II Housing will cost approximately the same as University Village.

Occupants of Phase II Housing would be billed two equal payments. Since the Spring semester is longer than the Fall semester, the payments are distributed equally rather than one semester being more expensive than the other.

“The students who have experienced it [two equal payments] have appreciated it,” Wright said.

In other news, Martin Mayor Randy Brundige gave the SGA Senate an update on projects taking place in Martin.

Brundige said that the new Wal-Mart Supercenter should be open by August 15 or 16, and that they should be hiring employees in April.

Brundige also said that a land deal was just made for a Hampton Inn to be built directly across from the Wal-Mart Supercenter project. “It [Hampton Inn] will be a great help to the university and to our city,” Brundige said.

The $4.3 million project will provide the city with a 55-65 room hotel. Brundige is hoping that the city will soon approve to advertise for a Community Development Director. This job would require a person to market Martin and attend various trade shows across the nation. “If we’re [City of Martin] going to move forward, we need this position,” Brundige said.

SGA President James Orr said that they have narrowed the search for the Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs position. There are now only 5 candidates left in running for the position.

Amber Niblock, representative of SAC, gave an update on current events happening in Martin. These include a table tennis tournament, Chocolate Fest on February 14 and a trip to Memphis to see a Grizzlies game on April 2.