Friends of East Campus
FRIENDS OF HISTORIC EAST CAMPUS
The Friends of Historic East Campus is a non-profit association which seeks to preserve, protect, and work for the adaptive reuse of the historic buildings and land space of the Historic East Campus; the birth site of Western Michigan University. Membership in this Association is open to all alumni, employees, students and/or friends of Western Michigan University who share this goal.
The Friends of Historic East Campus Executive Commitee meet the third Friday of each month. Quarterly meetings include the Executive Committee and the full FOHEC Board. These open meetings are held at noon in the Commons Room, Walwood Hall.
"How Are We Preserving Those Ivy Covered Walls?"
The FOHEC has engaged in a number of ongoing legislative initiatives in recent years including: holding legislative candidate forums; administering candidate surveys; writing letters and Viewpoints to local newspapers; encouraging the formation of a Southwest Michigan Coalition of legislators from the ten counties in our part of the state; testifying in support of WMU funding to both House and Senate Appropriations committees in the last two budget cycles.
This has taken FOHEC a bit beyond the concern for the buildings but we have moved in this direction for two reasons:
1. To strengthen our relationship with WMU leadership and demonstrate that we understand the budget crisis.
2. To lend credibility to our claim that we exist to PROTECT, Preserve, Restore, and Reuse the buildings on the East Campus. Right now we are feeling much better about WMU's efforts to deal with a number of issues.
A. PROTECTION--There has been good attention paid to securing the buildings from intrusion and vandalism.
B. THE WMU BOARD OF TRUSTEES--Last Fall the FOHEC chairperson had the opportunity to address the WMU Board of Trustees and clarify our relationship with the University. Please click on the "News" link to read the address.
C. THE IVY PULL--A coming event that should be fun is "The Ivy Pull." We recently co-sponsored along with the Kalamazoo Preservation Alliance and the City of Kalamazoo a workshop on "green preservation". The guest speaker toured East Campus and was enthusiastic about what East Hall could be. He also observed that the heavy growth of ivy was probably causing severe deterioration. We contacted Pete Strazdas of WMU to see what could be done. He suggested that his people cut the ivy at the base and in a few weeks when the vines are dead and dry FOHEC will have a community Ivy Pull. It could be fun, will get some good publicity, and incidentally slow down the damage to the buildings.
D. PLANS--Kalamazoo is alive these days with "PLANS". No real money but lots of plans. A group of local developers calling themselves, "SuiteIdea" are promoting an arena for the old Cole-Gilmore auto dealership property south of Kalamazoo Avenue and east of Westnedge Avenue, a nine acre site mostly owned by the WMU Foundation. Meanwhile, Downtown Kalamazoo and it's many subsidiaries are working with the City and the Chamber to update the Kalamazoo Master Plan. We are watching both of these initiatives very closely because of our insistence that the East Campus is an integral part of Downtown and the Vine Neighborhood. We are building our network and pushing the importance of the East Campus. Again, a new initiative for FOHEC but relevant.
