EAU CLAIRE — UW-Eau Claire Chancellor Jim Schmidt spoke to the crowd while standing at the site of what will become the Science and Health Science Building.
“Not so long ago, this day seemed like a far-off dream,” he said.
As a five-story, 330,000-square-foot and $340.3 million building, Thursday’s ceremony marked the beginning of construction on the project, a venture that has generated an immense amount of enthusiasm within the University.
“This building began as an audacious imagining, but will grow from today forward into an incubator for the next great advancements in science thanks to the collaborative efforts of this community over the course of many, many years,” Schmidt said.
With what the University has planned, the facility will become both the largest academic building on UW-Eau Claire’s campus and the largest science facility among other four-year universities in the region. The construction site sits at where the University’s Katharine Thomas and Putnam halls formerly were, right next to the McIntyre library on Garfield Ave.
The University’s plan is that the new building will also replace their current outdated science building, Phillips Hall, which was built 61 years ago. Intentions are to tear down Phillips Hall upon the Science and Health Science building’s completion, as the lot is converted into more green space and parking.
Additionally, the new science building highlights a partnership with the Mayo Clinic Health System as each floor will contain office, research and instructional space that the hospital system will occupy.
In anticipation of what scientific advancement this space could bring for the region, many individuals and organizations outside the University also attended Thursday’s ceremony and spoke on behalf of the science building.
“When the Chancellor came to the chamber board and said, ‘We need help advocating for this building,’ we looked beyond the academic purpose. We looked at how it is going to transform this community that we can’t totally envision today,” said Eau Claire Chamber of Commerce President David Minor.
“The building exemplifies the partnership of all of us working together — all of you,” said former Wisconsin Governor Tommy Thompson, speaking during the ceremony. “And now today, we are going to build the capstone — not the end, just the capstone for this period. A science building that is the largest capital expenditure the state has done.”
With the construction of the building starting, UWEC also released information on the contractors selected through their competitive bidding process. The general prime contractor is Miron Construction Co. of Neenah; the fire suppression subcontractor and plumbing subcontractor is Hooper Corp. of DeForest; the HVAC subcontractor is KBK Services Inc. of Ashland; and the electrical subcontractor is B&B Electric Inc. of Eau Claire.
Initial plans for a science building date back to 2019. UW-Eau Claire anticipates that construction will continue through 2026, in hopes that the new facility will be opened and operational by 2027.
“Along the way, we were supported by dozens and dozens of organizations who wrote letters, gave testimony to advance the project, as well as more than 350 external partners who worked with our STEM and health sciences programs over the last 10 years,” Schmidt said. “Our audacious vision, our commitment and our persistence have literally transformed the face of this campus and this community that will outlast us all.”
