The UK Board of Trustees finance committee meeting approved the pledge of $7,000,000 from Joe Craft and the Difference Makers to build a new UK men’s basketball dormitory on Tuesday.
UK Athletics Director Mitch Barnhart spoke before the committee to support the renaming of the residence to “Wildcat Coal Lodge,†as well as the “Replace Wildcat Lodge Student Housing†project. He said the first lodge was built in 1978, in support of the coal industry, and was renovated in 2000.
Barnhart said the December 2008 UK proposal to renovate the lodge with $1.5 million in private funds was essentially a “Band-Aid.â€
Barnhart said the residents of the Wildcat Lodge consist of half student-athletes, and another half that are approved through NCAA guidelines. The new building would be built on the northeast side of Memorial Coliseum and the old Wildcat Lodge would be used for temporary housing, until further plans could be made.
The report, which was approved with no objections, dealt exclusively with the financial aspect of the building, said finance committee chair Stephen Branscum. He said the issue of naming the new building would be dealt with in the main board meeting, which was held at 1 p.m. on Tuesday.
Also approved in the meeting was a report to approve renovations for the nursing school, which would cost $1.8 million. The cost of the renovations would be fully covered by a federal grant. The renovations of the Nutter Training Center meeting rooms were also approved, as well as the adoption of the UK Hazard Mitigation Plan, a blueprint for mitigation efforts in any given natural disaster.
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