HPER to reopen in summer

Students and staff will have to wait longer than originally planned for the completion of renovations in the Wildermuth Intramural Center since the center caught fire in July.

The basketball courts and indoor track at the center in the School of Health, Physical Education and Recreation will not be available for public use until summer 2012 at the earliest, said Jackie Puterbaugh, associate director of Campus Recreational Sports.

“Right now we are saying summer, but we are committed to re-opening for the fall,” she said.

In late July, Mark Land, associate vice president for university communications, told the IDS the repairs would be complete by mid-September.

But after the University called on experts, they revealed the damage was more extensive.

According to a report by Bloomington Fire Department Prevention Officer Scott Smith, three construction workers were using a 4-inch wheel grinder to remove steel gutter brackets from the building. The heat from their work sparked materials in the structure, and the fire broke out then quickly spread while construction workers repairing the roof were taking a break.

It was a three-alarm fire that took three hours and 50 firefighters to extinguish and caused heat, soot and water damage to the roof and inside of the structure.

Puterbaugh said the repairs have to be sequenced; in other words, most of the repairs cannot be completed at the same time.

They have to replace a section of the roof, clean the entire facility, repaint the walls and ceiling, tear out five of the 10 basketball courts and re-sand and re-finish the remaining five. They are still evaluating whether or not they need to replace the indoor track.

But Lexi Chaput, assistant director for informal sports and student personnel, said the CRS staff is trying to combat the misconception that the entire facility is unavailable.

“The basketball courts and the track are the only features of the WIC that are unavailable for use,” she said.

The martial arts studio, gyms 293, 171 and 163, pool 194, the racquetball courts and the Royer pool were undamaged and remain open to the public.

Although some space for basketball will be allotted in Wildermuth, most students have to migrate to the Student Recreational Sports Center.

“We are finding that students are starting earlier and finishing later and really adjusting,” Chaput said. “As long as we share what’s going on, students are extremely reasonable.”

Staffers are still trying to determine how they will tackle the challenge of relocating the winter intramural basketball, which usually takes place in the center’s gyms.

With winter looming, the staff at the SRSC is also preparing for the influx of indoor exercisers.

Chaput said they have added to their staff despite the locale downsizing, specifically for the position of informal sport supervisors, which are the students who scan IDs at the entrance to the SRSC and intramural center facilities.

They have added scanning stations throughout both facilities to ensure security and make it easier for people to come and participate.

Beth Lampert, a junior in kinesiology and CRS staff team leader, said the key to smoothly running facilities is the constant communication among the professional and student staff.

“They are always communicating with us through email and meetings,” she said. “So, we are able to explain what is going on to the participants, and so once they understand why we do what we do, it helps diffuse any problems.”

She said people who want to fulfill their New Year’s resolutions or sculpt their “spring break bods” but avoid the crowd should consider group exercise classes, which usually aren’t as busy, or exercise in the available spaces at the Wildermuth center.

Every year, 38,000 students use the recreational sports facilities, and 62 percent use them at least weekly.

“We have an extremely active campus, so having a space out of use that students consistently use makes it a top priority for us to finish this process as soon as possible,” Puterbaugh said.