DTD at MC #68

Monday, August 18, 2008

Hello everyone,

I got the following note from Jeremy Dornon, giving me heck for my inability to spell! Sorry Jeremy, it's fixed and I'll try not to do it again! I'm going to enjoy meeting the Delt Legacy you will be bringing.

Rick...As always, love receiving the updates in the inbox. Just a quick note, I am still attending the 40th, but I will be bringing someone, so please note me as +1 on the attendees list. Also, when you update the attendees list, my last name is spelled 'Dornon' not 'Dornan'. Nothing major, just fyi! Can't wait to kicking back at the TH with the brothers, and letting the majority of the guys meet my 2 yr old son, Braxton. Also a future Delt. :)

Tim Cox sent me the following note. I had him listed as an "I think" on the attendees list. Here he makes it official.

Hey Rick, Just wanted to let you know that I will definitely be attending the 40th festivities. What are the exact dates again?

Thanks,Tim CoxClass of '99

I answered Tim directly with the dates, but here they are along with the cost involved. Homecoming is October 24-26. And the cost is $50 per person attending. Please make your check payable to Crescent Colony of Marietta, Inc Send it to Bob Ferguson, **removed for privacy reasons** I hope to see many of you there.

Chad Rhodes sent me this note, he'll be there, how about you?

Rick, I'll be at the 40th, along with my wife, Krista. We've got the hotel reservations and the check will be in the mail shortly. I'm looking forward to meeting you and others and to catching up with old friends. Thanks for all of your work on the newsletter.

Chad Rhoads Class of 1995

Murray Talasnik sent me the following note. I suggested that he contact the alumni office, if any of you have a better suggestion for him, please drop him a line.

Hi all.
I was recently unpacking some long lost boxes and found some of my old Marietta College yearbooks. Unfortunately, I seem to have lost the 1971 yearbook, the year of my graduation. If anyone has any idaes about how I might find a replacement, I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks.
Murray Talasnik, class of 1971



I got this email from Hartsy, President of House Corp., concerning our meeting last week with the college about housing options. First of all, let me say that I received many very good replies last time I wrote. To all of you "Thank you." Your feelings were presented to the college by me when we met.

After some thought and further conversation with Ferg and Andy Longo, here's how I see our realistic options:

#1) We stay where we are as long as we can, and when we get word we have to leave, we look again at options.
#2) Let MC know that we are OK with the moving to the new residence hall, and wait to see what we get.
#3) Find a way to get some money into the new residence hall project, and continue to partner with the college.

There are other possibilities, but I see them all as variations of the above.

Right now I slightly favor #2 over #3, with #1 a distant 3rd. My stance on #3 could improve if I knew more about how we could get some form of equity stake in the residence hall. I lean toward #2 thinking that there may be more options in a few years, more time for fundraising, and in the mean time we have decent housing.

I'd be higher on #1 if we owned 219 4th right now. As Andy mentioned to me, we have no property to sell or rent if we just let the college move us.

The down side of #2 is that if we don't like what we get, we may be back to moving again in a few years.

That's all for now. See you guys soon.
Jon Hartshorn, ASQ CMQ/OE


Today, I sat down with Fergie and using Hartsy's email as a basis for discussion, put together the following thoughts.

From our talk with the college, they are planning on spending $200 a square foot to build the new residence hall. That means for us to have a 5000 sq ft house of our own, it would cost us $1,000,000. I don't see that happening, do you?

Secondly, the college is about $30,000,000 in debt, so this building is probably our only opportunity for new quarters in the forseeable future. Several thoughts came to mind as we were barnstorming, here are some of them in no particular order.

Fraternity size comes and goes. In 2000 we had 4 or 5 members, in 2006 we had 50, in 2008 we will start with 30+. We have been up and down for our entire history (as have all the other fraternities). So where will we be in 5 years? How about 10? It is impossible to know, but if we have our own house, we will have to pay for it. That means members, it would be a terrible thing (to my mind) to have to recruit men just to fill a house, not because they are quality people.

Right now, DTD is held in pretty high regard by the administration of the college. Who is to say what the case will be in 5 or 10 years. The people in charge with MC are in thier late 50's and early 60's. Perhaps thier replacements will be progreek, but maybe not. What do we do then?

Next, Lynne Miller, in her email said that the college was planning on providing the chapter with "adequate space" for meeting rooms and storage for our ritual equipment. The meeting mentioned that the college figured on 15 sq. ft. per student. If we figure the Delts get a membership of 60, that would give us 900 sq. ft. in public area. Of course we don't have 60 members. The college did seem receptive to our needs for more room however. It may become necessary for us to contribute if we wish for more space than they plan on for us. Right now, in the 4th St. Shelter, the back room (as best we could tell from outside) appears to be 32x23 (736 sq ft) for the chapter room and 32x42 (1344 sq ft) for the total addition. As I write that, it doesn't seem right. The total is close to accurate, not sure on the chapter room.

Unfortunately, we were ncluded in this discussion just recently, and as the discussion unfolded, it became pretty obvious that we should have been included 6 months ago, so we could have been better prepared. As of the time of our meeting, the college hadn't been able to arrange anything with the LCA so we don't know what thier thinking on this subject is.

When House Corp first began the discussion on this subject, our best thought was having our fraternity house on the front of a building and a dorm behind it. Actually that is what the college is proposing. We will have our own entrance at one end of the new hall, with our letters above the entrance. Beds for approximately 15 members (that is negotiable - but keep in mind, we weren't able to fill the house we have this year), dedicated outdoor space like we have now, for volleyball, etc., semi-private bathrooms (a definate improvement from what we have now), etc.

To reiterate what Hartsy said, here are the options I see for us.

#1 - Building of our own. The cost would be about $1 million. We don't have that much, and the cash flow options don't appear to make it workable. Even if we could get $300,000 from members (that's $750 each from 400 members - which we don't have yet) it still wouldn't work. And that is assuming we could get the land from Marietta College.

#2 - Stay where we are. Assuming that the college finds that our house is usable for the next 10 years at a reasonable cost, what happens in 10 years? That house won't last forever, as much as we would like it to. Remember, the college owns the house, they can decide it isn't cost effective at any time.

#3 - Move to a house on 4th St. (like the ATO's are in). They sleep 60. Do we want to have people sharing the house that aren't Delts? Remember, we have never had 60 in our history. It's an option, the college likes us right now.

#4 - Work with the college, move into the new residence hall and make it our own. This may cost us some money (probalbly will) to get enough common space to serve our needs.

#5 - Something else. There is always another option that hasn't been thought of.

My biggest concern is that we keep a level playing field. The ATO's will stay where they are, on 4th St. The assumption is that the DU's will be back in 2011, and they will be back in thier house. Will that put us at a competitive disadvantage?

Sorry this is so long. But I felt it needed to be. See you in October!

Have a great week. Rick Neel '73

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