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Cayuga Community College would buy the former P&C Foods store at River Glen Mall in Fulton to expand the growing branch of the college under a plan approved by the college’s trustees, Board of Trustees President John Camardo confirms today.
Trustees met Wednesday evening to approve buying the building and converting it into space for classes and offices. The projected cost: $11.23 million.
The project needs approval from Cayuga County’s Legislature, which meets today, and from the State University of New York. Cayuga County and SUNY would share the cost of the project.
Cayuga Community College would move across town, from the Fulton Commons plaza location that once was a department store, to space of about equal size at P&C. The current college space is 50,000 square feet, according to the college’s website. The P&C store is 50,000 square feet, but college spokesperson Pam Freeman said there is the possibility to add 20,000 square feet to the P&C space in a partial second floor.
The college would also have an opportunity to buy 40 acres of land adjacent to the 20 acre P&C site for future development.
Freeman said CCC is leasing its space at Fulton Commons. She said that the state has cut in half its aid to schools for renting space and “we’re vulnerable to the economic climate in Albany,” so it makes sense to try to buy a permanent facility. The college would also have more flexibility to make changes in a space that it owned.
Enrollment is rising quickly, up more than 20% since last year. “We’re really beyond capacity,” in Fulton, Freeman said.
The Fulton branch campus began as a pair of classrooms in the Fulton Education Center in 1994. By that fall, the college had moved to the former Holy Family School building. In 2001, the expanded facility at Fulton Commons opened. In 2006, the facility was officially designated a branch campus, meaning that entire degree programs could be offered in Fulton.
The college reports that by the Fulton campus’s 15th anniversary, more than 1,500 Oswego County residents had earned degrees and more than 6,500 county residents had taken at least one course there.
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