The Utah Board of Regents approved a proposal from Weber State University to purchase a piece of land in Hooper for a future satellite campus.
Regent member Jed Pitcher commended WSU for the amount of planning and work it has done to help with the growth of the university.
The owner of the land agreed to sell the property to WSU for $9,000. There is no current timetable for when construction will begin. Norm Tarbox, vice president for administrative services at WSU, said the Davis campus and the Ogden campus are doing well, and the school is looking to better serve the West.
“The western part of the valley is hard to get to and hard for a commute, so we’ve had a desire for quite some time to buy property out there to develop a satellite campus,” Tarbox said.
The university eventually would like to replace the West Center, located in a strip mall in Roy, with the Hooper campus. Tarbox said having a campus in Hooper would provide room for future growth for the school. Tarbox said the Hooper campus would help students meet their general education requirements without having to commute to Ogden or Davis.
“Our idea for the Hooper campus at this time is perhaps a community college center where the focus would be general education courses, things students need in the first two years of their college education,” Tarbox said.
WSU also requested to sell a 4.73-acre parcel of property located in west Kaysville. The land is no longer needed due to the Davis campus. Money from the sale of the land in west Kaysville will be used to help pay for the Hooper campus.
Tarbox also said WSU is planning to expand the Ogden Ice Sheet, adding another full NHL-size rink. He said that in the future, WSU hopes to add a second story to the ice sheet, which would be used for an indoor practice area for WSU Athletics. Tarbox said the regents will likely be asked to vote on that later this year.
“It so happens that we have a great need and desire to build an indoor practice facility for our athletic teams,” Tarbox said, “but have so far been unable to afford it.”
At the meeting, which was held at Southern Utah University, Tarbox also said WSU has agreed to a long-term lease of buildings at the Davis campus with the Northern Utah Academy for Math, Engineering and Science.
“Essentially, Weber State will become a landlord for the Northern Utah Academy for Math, Engineering and Science,” Tarbox said.
The board did not discuss when planning or construction will begin on the new campus or on the expansion to the ice sheet. WSU is also planning on expanding its Davis campus in Layton, which is expected to be completed in the fall of 2013.
The next Board of Regents meeting will be held in September in Logan at Utah State University. The board’s final meeting of the year will be on Nov. 16 at Utah Valley University in Orem.
