FMCC breaks ground for new dorm

PHOTOGRAPHER: Edward Munger Jr.

A population of students that currently turns away from Fulton-Montgomery Community College will have a reason next year to give it another look when a $7.1 million dorm construction project is finished.

College officials gathered at the Campus View housing complex Monday to celebrate the groundbreaking for a new, two-story co-ed dormitory to be built over the winter and completed in time for the fall semester in 2012.

Supported with a portion of an $11.3 million loan from the USDA Community Facility Program, the project will double the school’s on-campus housing capacity, currently only 144 beds, a number so low it has likely caused the loss of potential students looking to live on campus, college officials said.

College policy requires full-time first-year students to live on campus in an effort to provide the guidance of a residential life director, as well as security. But numerous waivers are granted to that requirement, with a lack of sufficient housing forcing officials to limit the housing waiting list to 50 over the past three years, forcing some students who want to live on campus to look elsewhere, college President Dustin Swanger said.

“Some will pursue in-city housing. Many just don’t come,” he said.

The project took about 18 months to work its way through the planning process. Despite the approach of winter, work will continue through the season. A foundation for the new two-story dormitory will be built this winter while modular units are constructed in Pennsylvania.

In the spring, those units will be trucked to the college and put together on the site, located just south of the current, three-story Campus View housing complex off Bendick Corners Road.

Architect David A. D’Amore of Johnstown-based AND Architecture & Design said the modular construction is just as solid as a structure built on site, and it allows for construction to continue through the winter.

Plans call for a 10-foot walkway to be cordoned off during the work to avoid impacting current students heading to and from the existing building, D’Amore said.

Johnstown town Supervisor Jack Wilson congratulated college officials for the addition during Monday’s ceremony.

“This college is definitely a crown jewel in the Fulton and Montgomery community neighborhoods,” he said.

FMCC Board of Trustees Vice-Chairman Jim Landrio called Monday a “historic day.”