Brighter future in store for campus

Cal State Long Beach should soon begin implementation of two projects to improve lighting on campus, but both projects are currently delayed.

Senior Director of Physical Planning and Management Facilities Tom Bass said one project will change the two-headed floodlights in Lot A into four-headed ones.

Materials for this project are expected to be delivered by the end of November. Director of Plant Operations Jeanne O'Dell said that work on the project will begin as soon as the materials arrive.

The second project calls for $121,899 to upgrade the lighting fixtures in the University Student Union. But unlike the Lot A project, work on this one will take longer to begin because of the construction of CSULB's central plant.

O'Dell said the lights were to be installed in August but work on the central plant took priority. "The new lights were going to go exactly where the contractors are trenching," O'Dell said.

Plant Operations made plans for the USU lighting project more than a year ago. Engineers and contractors were hired to install a total of 130 lights at the Student Union and two lights at the Soroptimist House. Most of the work, however, consists of replacing old lighting fixtures with more efficient ones.

Robert Lara, Student Union assistant director, said that funding for the lighting project will come from the Student Union's repair-and-replacement reserve funds.

O'Dell said central plant construction at the prospective lighting locations should be finished within eight weeks, so installation work could begin then.

Bass said that while there haven't been any formal complaints about lighting from students, his department, along with Public Safety and Plant Operations, have chosen to take "a pro-active measure in identifying areas of concern, specifically as it relates to construction activity and [the resulting] disruption to our normal lighting configuration."

"If we receive expressions of concerns, then we'll have someone [from Public Safety] look at the area to determine if there's something happening there," Bass said. "Significant improvements have taken place and there are still more to come. [We work] as we identify issues and problems or as they are reported to us."

As an example, Public Safety Director Jack Pearson said his department had expressed concerns to the central plant contractors about the displacement of lamps along Friendship Walk due to the plant construction. The contractors immediately responded by installing temporary halogen lamps.