New Fund-Raising Drive Started for Student Center

California State University, Dominguez Hills, has accelerated fund-raising efforts for a new student center in hopes of starting the $8.9-million project on the Carson campus in the fall of 1988.

Officials said about 80% of the center’s cost has been raised or pledged so far, largely from student fees, earlier fund-raisers and private donations, leaving a gap of about $1.5 million that the university plans to fill through a new fund-raising campaign begun last week.

President Richard Butwell said Ernest J. Panosian of Santa Barbara, a longtime Dominguez Hills supporter, will head the effort aimed at industry, business and community donors.

The two-story center will be constructed just north of the campus library and provide 60,430 square feet of space for student offices and organizations, meetings of campus, community and alumni groups, seminars, dining and recreation and a privately owned bookstore, said Cindy Young, university director of development.

Two Without Centers

Only Dominguez Hills and Bakersfield among the state’s 19-campus system do not have permanent student centers.

Young said the two campuses were left out in the cold in the 1970s when a state law banned further use of government funds for the construction or operation of student centers. Financing for the centers then became dependent on student fees, she said, but rising operating costs and high inflation rates in the last decade limited the growth of a construction fund.

In the last year, the capital fund received a big boost when 74% of Dominguez Hills students voted to double their student activities fees to $40, and a fund drive netted about $640,000 from the university’s faculty and staff. Young said about 66% of the $8.9-million construction cost will come from student fees.

A temporary student center has been operating in a former library building called the Commons. Young said the space is often jampacked with students looking for a place to eat lunch, study or relax.

The Dominguez Hills campus opened in 1967 and has about 7,300 full- and part-time students.