Cornell University will invest $20 million over the next 10 years in the Ithaca, N.Y., community in order to create affordable housing and public transportation for faculty, staff and students, Cornell President David Skorton announced last month.
According to Stephen Golding, executive vice president for finance and administration at Cornell, Skorton asked his senior staff about a year ago to "step back and think about key strategic areas that the university should be partnering with the local community on, to ensure over the next 20 to 25 years that the area remains economically strong and culturally and socially vibrant."
Six key themes were identified as critical areas: healthcare, pre-kindergarten through 12th-grade education, the environment, housing, economic development and infrastructure. Several teams then looked at the various topics that comprise each of these "strategic areas" to determine "what the university can and should do," he said.
The decision to focus on housing was made because of a recognized need for more affordable housing for faculty, staff and students, Golding said, adding that any new plans will be developed "in concert with local community plans" in order to ensure "that we do this thoughtfully and carefully."
Transportation is also a focus, as the university would like to reduce the volume of single-occupancy vehicles that travel through campus and Ithaca at large, a result of the long commutes of many in the area. Reducing the number of vehicles on the road and having a more viable public transit system would "alleviate pressure on the local community," Golding said.
The specifics of how the $20 million will be applied to housing and transportation are not clear yet. "The final determination for what we do and how we do it and what the characteristics of the program are will be informed by conversations with local community leadership. We think we know what we need to provide, but we want to do it in a way that's sensitive to our community," Golding said.
Ithaca is currently in the midst of its own building plans, both independent of and in concert with Cornell. There is "a lot of planning being fairly well coordinated (and) money behind our initiatives is a welcome sign," said John Gutenberger, director of community relations for Cornell.
Gutenberger said the $20 million investment is important for short-term planning, because "if we invest wisely and if we do our job and there are positive community results coming out of that ... it will bring more community dollars to the table."
Cornell currently gives about $2 million a year to Ithaca, some of which is earmarked for the local fire department, which serves the university. A separate contribution is also made to the Ithaca school district each year.
Like any university and its surrounding community, Cornell and its neighbors have their tensions, but relations are generally positive and are improving, Golding said, "directly due to the fact that the president believes a strong relationship is absolutely critical to benefit the community and Cornell."
In order to move forward with housing and transportation planning in tandem with local communities, Cornell has asked all of its neighbors - the Town of Ithaca, the City of Ithaca and various other towns, in total five different political constituencies - to bring forward any housing strategies or priorities. Housing will be a collaborative effort to "positively impact community-wide strategy," Gutenberger said.
The university is looking at the possibility of constructing new housing, particularly in the form of townhouses or apartments in the downtown area, as well as building homes near campus or offering mortgage assistance on already existing structures.
"We don't want people to have to drive 30 to 40 minutes to work, we don't want cars driving through to exacerbate relations (because) of congestion and we have a need for a specific type of housing. This combination leads us to believe that over the next 10 years, by committing to these programs, we can improve life for faculty, staff and students," Golding said.
According to Richard Spies, Brown's executive vice president for planning and senior adviser to the president, such an investment by Brown in Providence is a possibility. Though a large investment in infrastructure in the community is not in the University's short-term plans, Spies said he "wouldn't be surprised" if in 10 to 15 years the University were to "invest in something to be built."
But Spies stressed that Brown's situation cannot be compared directly to Cornell because they are in a "different situation than a more urban university." Any future building projects at Brown would more likely take place in "undeveloped or underdeveloped areas," not in Brown's immediate surroundings, given that "the residential neighborhood is well established," Spies said.
Spies said there was no pressing need to invest in housing near Brown. Unlike in Ithaca, there is a "fair amount" of reasonably priced housing located close to the Brown campus for students and faculty.
At Brown, approximately 55 percent of faculty and 35 percent of staff live in Providence, Spies said. At Cornell, a third of faculty and staff have a 25-to-30-minute commute, according to Golding.
Brown's direct relationship with the city of Providence is "developing and evolving," a necessary component for future growth, Spies said. President Ruth Simmons has noted this relationship as an important point to which the University needs to devote more focus and has asked Spies to "step up our involvement," he added.
Like Cornell, Brown contributes annually to its larger community, giving about $1.5 million, which was "designed to allow the city to use it as they see best," Spies said. The donation is meant to "recognize that we benefit from the city, and in our own way support it." The payments are made in lieu of property taxes, from which universities are generally exempt.
