Money Grows on Trees (Just Not the Willow)

Photo Credits: Azam Hostetler

The University of New Haven broke ground on a $45 million business building last week. The student body would like a word.  

On September 18, the University officially broke ground on Martin Family Hall, the future home of the Pompea College of Business. If you’ve passed by that hill lately, you’ve seen the start of it: fencing, heavy machinery, and a memorable stench. According to the University’s project page, the building will be 50,000 square feet, cost a projected $45 million and will sit at the southeast entrance to campus near Campbell Avenue and Ruden Street. The University calls it a gateway, the first building students and visitors will see on the way in. The plan is to move the business college back onto the main campus and to create a new quad with South Campus Hall and Harugari Hall.  

The features list reads like a pitch deck. There’s an AI, Business Analytics and Financial  Trading Room with live data. There’s an Executive Boardroom where students will present to industry leaders, a Business Pitch Classroom, and the Sussman Family Sales Institute, which the university describes as the ONLY? space of its kind in Connecticut, while students are asking if that means “more Recognized Student Organization storage rooms?” The centerpiece of this new building is a four-story vertical stock ticker running up the grand staircase, because nothing says welcome to campus like watching the market dip while you climb to your 8 a.m. The building is also designed to meet LEED Gold standards, a certification for environmentally responsible construction. 

Keep that in mind.  

The University is clear that this is a philanthropic project. Alumnus Dennis Martin, ’81, and his wife, Barbara, gave $10 million as the leadership gift, and the building carries their family name. Charlie and Tamera Pompea, whose name is already on the college, are credited as major supporters. The rest of the $45 million is being raised through a capital campaign. The donor section of the website promises more stories soon. For now, it is a nice page with a whole lot of thank-yous. 

And yes, of course we shouldn’t be ungrateful, but does being grateful means staying silent? Especially when treasures are taken away from the students and visitors. Students are supposed to spend the best four years of their lives on this campus and yet here they are. This building is FOR the students but not everyone is lining up for the ribbon cutting. If anything the students have strong feelings about the future of this building. “A brand-spanking new building surrounded by old, structured buildings, that’s going to be ugly.” Whatever goes up at the busiest entrance to campus will be seen by everyone, every day, whether they like it or not. That’s the point of a gateway, and it’s also the problem with one.  

Then there’s the money. We don’t need a new building; we need them to fix the old ones that are falling apart. Anyone who has been in any of the older buildings on campus can probably finish that thought for themselves. To be fair, donor money doesn’t work like a checking account. Gifts can sometimes come with conditions, and this one clearly comes with a name attached. A donor wanting their name on a building isn’t typically going to write a check for a new elevator somewhere. That’s a real constraint and the University deserves the benefit of the doubt. But it is also true that the University chose to raise money for something new, rather than launch a campaign to fix the spaces students are in right now. Both things can be true at once, but humans are creatures of habit, and students are not terribly happy that an old willow tree on the grounds was cut down.  

People are talking about it, quite a lot. They cut down the old tree on the site to make room for the new building. When students raised the question, the University’s response was that the wood would be used in the new building. It is a thoughtful gesture and an efficient one. Nothing wasted. Very LEED Gold, but it answers a question nobody asked. The willow wasn’t lumber to the people who sat under it, took photos with it, or just liked seeing it on the way to class. Turning it into a wall panel or a bench doesn’t give it back. There’s something a little ironic about the University advertising a new gateway to campus when the old one was a view students actually cared about. A landscape people had feelings for is being replaced with a ticker that refreshes every few seconds. Make of that what you will.  

But let’s be honest: there were doubts when the Bergami Center for Science, Technology and  Innovation was being built, and here we are. That building has become one of the most visited spots on campus by the student body. So, Martin Family Hall will probably be a great building. The renderings are impressive, the donors are generous and future business students will likely benefit. But our old willow will forever be missed and no matter how many new trees get planted, they will not replace the memories and love that was torn apart and buried with the willow. Innovation is not always welcome. With growth comes growing pains, but this specific pain could have been avoided. As a building that is supposed to be for the students, their opinion was not part of the decision making process.