Trustee meetings convene

Meetings will end with Friday groundbreaking of Sansom Common. The University's Board of Trustees began three days of meetings yesterday which will include the adoption of a 1998 budget, the re-election of Board of Trustees chairperson Roy Vagelos and the groundbreaking of the Sansom Common project. Trustees will discuss facilities and campus planning, legal affairs, student life, external affairs and the audit of the University's crime statistics in closed meeting scheduled for today and tomorrow. But members of the University community are allowed to attend selected events on Friday. Motions scheduled to be voted on during closed meetings also include the reelection of Board of Trustees vice chairpersons Gloria Twine and Susan Catherwood, the election of the executive committee and the reelection of other term and emeritus trustees. Vagelos said the most important issues under consideration are the approval of the University's budget, the planning of the West Philadelphia Project for area improvement, the updating of the Special Services District -- an organization put together by local property owners to clean and secure an area -- and start of the Sansom Common project. The ceremonial groundbreaking of Sansom Common on the 3600 block of Walnut Street is scheduled for 1:45 p.m. on Friday. "The administration and trustees really believe that [the project] is going to be the start of an exciting change between 36th and 37th streets and Walnut and Chestnut streets," Vagelos said. "It's going to be a very, very important part of campus." The University will finish the project -- which will include shops, restaurants and a hotel -- within the next two years. Announced in November at a University Council meeting, the Sansom Common project will resemble the popular commercial area located in Manayunk. There will be a new University Bookstore managed by Barnes & Noble. The Bookstore will sell both new and used course books, as well as those supplies found in a commercial store. Sansom Common will also include a hotel called the Inn at Penn, complete with six floors and a total of 250 guest rooms. Valet parking, banquet and meeting rooms, a 3700-foot restaurant with a bar, a health and fitness club and a gift shop will also be available. The University will build a new street extending from the main entrance of the Inn to Chestnut Street, and retail shops and townhouses will line it. The estimated cost of the project is estimated $120 million, which will be raised from private investments. Debts will be repaid with the revenues of the hotel and retail stores. The 36th Street Plaza -- which will be built adjacent to the Inn -- will include a sidewalk wide enough for outdoor dining, public gatherings and other social activities. "We want to create a vibrant, round-the-clock exciting destination," University President Judith Rodin said earlier this year.