Although the plans were announced in May, Cole Hall is no closer to being remodeled than when the building first closed.

That’s because the funding of the estimated $7.7 million project is tied to the state’s capital budget; the same capital budget Illinois lawmakers have been fighting over for weeks.

The renovation plans call for the classroom in which a gunman opened fire Feb. 14, killing five students and wounding 17 before killing himself, to be remodeled for non-classroom use. The other classroom will be used as normal.

Another 500-seat lecture hall will also have to be built.

“Taking one 500-seat auditorium out of service requires us to replace that classroom space elsewhere on campus,” said NIU President John Peters in an e-mail dated May 7, 2008. “More than 12,000 students had classes in Cole Hall this academic year, so the need to replace lost instructional space is very real.”

NIU students, staff, and faculty had the opportunity to voice their opinion regarding the future of Cole Hall in a survey released by the university.

Melanie Magara, assistant vice president of public affairs, said that NIU remains hopeful that NIU’s situation will urge Illinois lawmakers to act.

But NIU is not the only institution seeking funding for capital projects, she said.

“We haven’t had a capital bill in eight or nine years,” Magara said. “There’s a lot of pent-up demand; not just from NIU, but all-around the state.”

Some of those demands include infrastructure. One year after the I-35W Mississippi River bridge in Minneapolis, Minn. collapsed and killed 13 people, more 4,300 out of 26,000 bridges in Illinois are considered structurally deficient or functionally obsolete, the Chicago Tribune reported Aug. 1.
Ken Zehnder, associate director of state relations, said the capital bill is in flux.

“There was a capital bill that passed the Senate, was not passed by the House,” Zehnder said, “Although Cole Hall was funded in that legislation, because it wasn’t passed through, it’s still under consideration.”

Compounding the situation is that Illinois legislators have already left for break. Zehnder said their next session begins Nov. 11, but the governor has the power to call them back into a special session to approve a specific bill.

It is unknown when the capital bill will be approved, because the leaders of the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the governor’s office have to agree on the bill.

“Right now, no one knows whether that will happen, and, if it stands a chance to happen, when it will happen,” Zehnder said.

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