Women gather for groundbreaking at new Locust Walk women's center

In the front yard of the boarded-up Theta Xi fraternity house at 37th Street and Locust Walk, more than 30 women gathered to celebrate the groundbreaking of the future site of the Penn Women's Center. "This location highlights the central role women play on campus as students, faculty and staff," University President Judith Rodin said during the ceremony yesterday afternoon. Phoebe Leboy, outgoing chairperson of the Women's Center Advisory Board, reminded the crowd of a different era, when the University was not as receptive to women's concerns. "Many of us go back to a time when we weren't allowed to sit on College Green and we weren't allowed to eat in Houston Hall," she said. College junior Colleen Mastony, editor of Generation XX, a campus magazine for women, said the new site will give women a stronger presence on Locust Walk. "You look down the Walk and you see fraternities and the Wharton School, which are dominated by men," Mastony added. "I think it's about time we had a women's center on the Walk." The center will fill the vacant Theta Xi fraternity house. Theta Xi's national office ordered the University's chapter to cease operations and vacate the house in November 1992. Last year, former Interim President Claire Fagin announced the Women's Center would move into the empty building. "It's a shame that Theta Xi is no longer here, but the University is moving in a different direction," said Stefan Politz, a College senior and former Theta Xi brother. "I think it's great to have women present on the Walk." Architect Evelyn Rousso -- who is designing the renovations -- said the University decided not to destroy the house because it dates back to the 1860s, prior to the University's relocation to West Philadelphia. "We are gutting the inside," Rousso said, adding that renovations could cost over $1 million. In addition to preparing the first and second floors for use by the Women's Center, seminar rooms will be built on the first floor. These rooms will be available to any campus group, Rousso said. She added that the plans should be finished by September, with work beginning sometime during the next academic year. She predicted the house would be occupied in September, 1996. Elena DiLapi, director of the Women's Center, said the new site will be more accessible and have better facilities than the center's current location in Houston Hall. DiLapi explained that after a series of rapes in and around campus, women staged a sit-in at College Hall in 1973, after which the University agreed to provide an on-campus women's center, which opened in the fall of 1974. At a rally for increased security on campus in 1989, demonstrators spontaneously began chanting "take back the Walk," according to DiLapi. They wanted to "make the center of campus reflect the diversity of Penn so that women of color and women could participate in the privilege of living on the Walk," she said. But some onlookers were somewhat wary of moving the Center to the walk. "I'm afraid that the Women's Center is going to speak for a very small group on campus," said College sophomore Tom McFadden. McFadden added the Center would be positive if it does not become "isolationist."