Maintenance Continues to Frustrate Students, Professors
by Kulsoom Rizvi
The current Calcia Hall building, home to around 800 art students, will be replaced with a new arts facility located near Sprague Field, a tentative location, according to Vice President of University Facilities Greg Bressler.
The replacement of Calcia Hall is a $12. 6 million project set to begin construction sometime between the fiscal year of 2013-2014, according to the Capital Master Plan.
Calcia Hall was built over 40 years ago, and according to Bressler, it suffers from extensive non-code complying situations, deteriorated systems and furnishings, and out of date HVAC systems.
“There have been so many issues over the years that we decided it would be less expensive to build a new building rather than completely renovate the current one,” Bressler said.
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Bressler said that it is not possible to completely renovate Calcia Hall, because there would be no space for students and professors to continue with classes while the building is being fully repaired.
Bressler added that the university will continue to complete work orders for Calcia Hall and put in money to help with modifications.
However, students and faculty, who work and take classes in Calcia Hall, are still frustrated over the lack of attention the building receives when it comes to maintenance.
“When you go in [Calcia Hall], the first thing you notice is how extreme the temperature is,” sophomore Lucy Robinson, a film major, said. For example, Robinson explained how Rm. 135, which is the auditorium on the first floor of Calcia Hall, is extremely hot especially when classes go on for three hours in the lecture-style room.
Sophomore Lucy Robinson had a meeting with Dean of Students Rose Mary Howell and Associate Dean of the Arts Ronald Sharps last semester about the lack of maintenance in Calcia Hall. Photo taken by Jillian Keats.
Back in September 2009, a work request was sent in about how the auditorium was “too cold’ and the temperature needed adjustment which was completed in December. In January, a work order was placed concerning Calcia Hall being “too hot;” the auditorium and classrooms were “unbearably hot.”
Robinson, last semester, had a meeting with Dean of Students Rose Mary Howell and Associate Dean of the Arts Ronald Sharps about the lack of maintenance in Calcia Hall. One of issues Robinson addressed was the graffiti drawn all over the walls at the lower level of the building.
The wall was painted over. However, a few days later, someone wrote over the paint “Dean Sharps, Thanks so much for the paint. Now can you fix what’s broken.” Several statements such as this one were written all over the first floor walls.
“I’m very happy that the university knows we have this issue and plans on building another building, but I’m never going to see that building,” Robinson said. “What are they going to do now?”
Sophomore Meaghan McDermott was in the printmaking studio and shared the discussion she had with another person who has been at Montclair State for 20 years.
“She said Calcia hasn’t changed at all since she’s been here. The most frustrating thing is the heating and cooling issue in rooms. In the metal and jewelry studio, the temperature can be [as] high as 87 degrees, and the windows don’t open, so that’s annoying,” McDermott said as she continued to work on her printmaking. “They don’t care about us at all.”
Work orders for Calcia Hall from 2009-2010 indicate that there have been 112 work orders closed and nine still open.
Someone wrote over the newly painted wall “Dean Sharps, Thanks so much for the paint. Now can you fix what’s broken.” Several statements such as this one were written all over the first floor walls. Photo by Jillian Keats.
Many of the requests deal with heating and leaking issues where two requests from a few days ago state that there is no heat in CA-117 and CA-215 which are offices. Some of the orders were responded quickly; for example, on Jan. 21, there was an urgent request which read: WINDOWS IN THE PRINTMAKING STUDIO IN CALCIA HALL ROOM CA-228 HAVE BLOWN OPEN AND CANNOT BE CLOSED DUE TO MISSING HARDWARE. WIND AND RAIN HAVE DAMAGED EQUIPMENT IN THE CLASSROOM.
The order was completed the next day, however, another request for the same room, made the same day, has not been answered.
Back in February 2008, a pipe from the ceiling had burst in Calcia Hall, which caused a steam flood in Director of the Photography Program Klaus Schnitzer’s office.
While sitting in his office, Schnitzer pointed out several frames hung on his walls with photos that still have mold from the flood two years ago.
“There is the lack of maintenance, but also, the lack of response from the administration. You submit work orders, and they go to a black hole,” Schnitzer said.
In the corner of his office, Schnitzer said ceiling tiles would fall on his desk once or twice a year and although it was temporary fixed, a tube connected to the heating unit vent wasn’t installed until ten years later. The highest temperature in his office was 115 degrees at one time.
“Certain problems are fixed, but they are just temporary, not permanent,” Schnitzer said. “Art is messy. It’s the nature of the beast, but that does not mean the building should be messy as well.”
At one point, Schnitzer did a “test” where he left a pile of dirt under his desk, and it was there for most of last semester.
“We feel neglected,” he said.
Several ceiling tiles in the CA-110 were water-logged and in danger of collapsing. A work order request was submitted back in November to fix the leaking ceiling pipe, but nobody answered until December after a second attempt.
In December 2009, water was coming into the building along the northeast side of the building due to damaged flashing on the roof. The water was running into the building from the northeast entrances and along the northeast walls of the classrooms.
In the jewelry and metalworking studio, the sink was leaking and draining water was collected in a bucket.
“The filter probably hasn’t been changed, since the building was built,” junior Melissa Graff said who uses the studio.
Graff added that the temperature in the room is never controlled with heat or air conditioning.
“It’s been as hot as probably 99 degrees and as cold as 40. If your hands are too cold, you can’t work, and if you’re too hot, you feel like you’re going to pass out,” she said.
When told about the new arts building being constructed in the future, Graff responded, “Even if they put up a new building, it will need a maintenance crew to be checking the plumbing, ventilation, etc. on a regular basis, otherwise over years, it will become [what Calcia is now].”
