NMC pushes on with facility upgrades

The Northern Marianas College is pushing on with facility upgrades but major reconstruction to its campus remains a no-go.

One upgrade, a $300,000 bid to convert its campus to energy-efficient air-conditioning, has received responses from companies and will soon be awarded, according to Board of Regents member William Torres, who chairs the fiscal committee on facilities.

Also in the works is a plan to apply for an Office of Insular Affairs grant for solar energy conversion. Torres said the college had “good chances” of receiving this award.

Of the $270,000 OIA grant received last month for facility upgrades, Torres said the board hopes the college will use a portion of those funds for the student parking lot in front of Building A.

The site is notorious for a ditch that often fills with stagnant water. Torres said money from the grant could be used to put a grid on the drainage in the area. He described the flooding as “unhealthy.”

Torres said there is still “so much to work on” in regards to NMC’s campus, which was built on or about 1955 as a single-story, semi-concrete hospital.

“What we really need is new construction,” he said yesterday.

In 2011 the board adopted a master plan for construction. In 2012, As Terlaje was set as the permanent location for NMC for the next 15 years. Also that year, an ad-hoc task force committee was formed to address the issue, according to board minutes.

It was reported that over $1 million were spent for on the four master plan designs.

This year, NMC completed renovations to its Building K and reroofing of several other buildings using $800,000 in OIA money. This money was awarded six years ago in 2008.

Torres said $144,000 of that amount remained as of 2014.

In March, financing options for the master plan were presented to NMC president Dr. Sharon Hart. They included general obligation bonds, revenue bonds, or a conventional loan.

For federal funding options, the college looked to Guam where U.S. Department of Agriculture loans, OIA CIP funds, and U.S. Department of Education grants were availed of to develop facilities in the community college and university there.
It was reported that no CIP funds for NMC were allotted for 2015, according to the CNMI CIP spending plan submitted to the Office of Insular Affairs.