After the Board of Trustees approved the request for funding to plan a move for the North Carolina Community College System headquarters April 18, they have begun discussing the possibility of moving to Centennial Campus more heavily, according to Audrey Bailey, community college system spokesperson.

Bailey said while it is still not certain that the state community college system will be relocating, it will meet with the General Assembly next month to request $4.3 million for the preliminary planning of making a move.

“Before you make a major move like that or build a large building there has to be preliminary work that goes into it, in addition to the architectural renderings,” Bailey said. “That costs money, so that’s what we’re after now.”

She added the system has not added a location to the request for funding because it is still too early in the planning process. However, she said Centennial Campus is at the “top” of their list.

“There aren’t any [locations we’re looking at] right now but we don’t know what will come up in the future,” Bailey said.

While nothing may come out of it, Bailey said she will wait until they discuss the idea with the legislature and the state board.

Centennial Campus is very appealing, she said, because it’s a conveniently located, publicly owned location, and the center has already established a presence in the Biotechnology Education Training Center.

“We already have a presence, so it would simply be adding onto a presence that we already have at Centennial Campus,” she said.

According to Bailey, if the center does receive the planning money from the General Assembly it will still be at least three years until they relocate. However, she said they would be moving into a brand new building.

“We’re planning it so we would have perhaps another agency also catered in that building, perhaps Commerce,” she said.

Bailey said that there are several reasons why the headquarters need to be relocated, such as the fact that there is both limited space inside and limited parking outside of the Caswell building in downtown Raleigh, where they are located. She said it is also in an unhealthy environment.

“We have some air quality issues, we have a problem with the sewer backing up into the building, we have some mold in some places … it’s an unhealthy building,” she said.

However, Bailey added that if the building were renovated after the headquarters moved out, it may be an advantage for other state agencies.

“When there are other renovations happening in state government people could be located in that building while their building is being renovated, or another state agency that is presently leasing … could locate in that building,” she said.

Sara Falardeau, sophomore in English, said that having the center on campus would also provide several advantages to students.

“When I took classes at a community college I was confused about what would transfer and I ended up taking the class again here,” she said. “If the headquarters were closer you could go there and talk to them and problems like that would be more easily resolved.”

Ashley Schmidt, freshman in First Year College, agreed with Falardeau and also added that it would be a benefit for the University to have the state government building on campus.

“It would make the University better recognized,” Schmidt said.