In the wake of campus clamor over the proposal to fill in one-fifth of the Lagoon, University President Henry Bienen said Wednesday that he will form an advisory committee of students, faculty and staff to assist him in planning construction at Northwestern.
The two-year committee will comprise five faculty members, three undergraduate students, three graduate students, two deans and three staff members. They will advise Bienen on long-term planning, learn the history of development issues and inform the community of construction plans.
“The more I reflected in the aftermath of the Lagoon, I thought that it would be a very useful idea for representatives from both campuses to have a better understanding of these kinds of long-run space concerns,” Bienen said. “I thought it would be a good idea for the people who make decisions about these kinds of things to have good input.”
Bienen said similar committees exist at many other universities.
Justin Conroy, coordinator of financial aid for incoming students, said the committee’s creation is a positive step but doesn’t guarantee that the community will impact these projects.
“You definitely need as much input as possible,” Conroy said. “I hope it’s not one of those puppet-government things, where he has the committee but he doesn’t listen to what they say.”
While Bienen said the group will not make executive decisions, he added that its efficiency will influence how seriously he takes its advice.
“You don’t like to waste people’s time, including my own,” he said. “When you set something up, you expect it to make serious input.”
Economics Lecturer Mark Witte said he expects the administration to consider the committee’s input when making decisions.
“Students and faculty are rather bright and have a lot of good ideas about how things could be and potential problems about possible changes,” said Witte, faculty adviser to Associated Student Government. “The university is run by reasonable people who want to make informed decisions.”
Nominations are now being accepted for all positions on the committee. Administrators have asked all of the deans for faculty and staff nominations, but anyone can submit a nomination.
Neil Helbraun, former coordinator of Northwestern Open Campus Coalition, said the committee is a good first step toward promoting “transparency” in NU’s decision making.
“Throughout the whole process last quarter, we had a difficult time even speaking about the right issues because so little is made public,” said Helbraun, a Weinberg senior who helped found the group in response to the Lagoon announcement. “When we say transparency, it’s sort of taking out of the dark and demystifying what happens. I don’t think that’s very much to ask at all.”
Bienen said some issues the committee reviews will be kept confidential, but most probably will be open to the general NU community.
Conroy said he hopes one of the issues addressed will be NU’s relations with Evanston, including the Northeast Evanston Historic District, which largely prevents NU from building west of Sheridan Road.
