Museum, SLCC join together downtown

Salt Lake Community College just got a little cozier with the Museum of Utah Art and History, essentially joining the two at the hip at the school's Main Street Center in Salt Lake City.

The school and museum Thursday were granted permission by the State Board of Regents to enter into a 15-year lease agreement.

The plan now is for the museum, affiliated with the Smithsonian and set to open within the next year or so, to rent 20,000 square feet (two floors) in the SLCC building, located at 115 S. Main. The cost will be $8 per square foot.

The cost for the museum to renovate the space is expected to reach $1.7 million. The museum will also occupy its own building next door to the newly renovated SLCC, which reopened in October. Construction crews will structurally marry the two buildings by knocking out a dividing wall.

SLCC vice president of business services, Don Porter, called the lease arrangement the "magic solution" to developing a relationship with the museum. He also sees it as a way to help SLCC develop curriculum at the school, which already has more than 200 students signed up for 55 different classes at the center for spring semester.

• In other news, regents gave the University of Utah approval to create a doctoral program in physical therapy and an entrepreneurship major within its business program.

• Regents also approved a policy change saying nonresidents who can present clear evidence that their purpose in moving to Utah was to accept full-time employment and not to attend college should receive the lower resident tuition rates if they decide to seek a higher education without first fulfilling current Utah requirements. Institutional policies currently state that nonresident students who seek resident tuition rates should have first completed 60 semester hours as a nonresident student or have lived in Utah for two years as a nonstudent.

E-mail: sspeckman@desnews.com