REGENTS TO DECIDE SHOW ME CENTER ADDITION

David Ross maneuvers through the cluttered corners of the Show Me Center stacked full of chairs, tables, curtains, the basketball floor, six basketball goals, 32,000 square feet of charcoal-colored carpet, a stage broken down into 75 sections, and enough plywood to fill a hardware store.

Ross, the Show Me Center director, is thrilled that Southeast Missouri State University plans to expand the 14-year-old building to provide needed storage space. The addition to the north side also will include new offices for the men's and women's basketball coaches and a second-floor patio.

The university administration will ask the Board of Regents to approve the $1.5 million project Friday. It is one of six construction projects on the agenda for the regents' meeting, which begins at 9 a.m. in the University Center Ballroom.

The regents also will vote on plans for construction of a $13.2 million residence hall on Henderson Avenue, a nearly $1 million addition to the polytechnic building, River Campus hiking and biking trails, a $150,000 interactive television classroom for the Kennett Higher Education Center and design work for a parking garage proposed to be built west of the Student Recreation Center.

The Show Me Center's storage area covers 3,000 square feet, and it isn't enough. "You need a crowbar to get into it," Ross said.

Makeshift storage

Ross has turned meeting rooms and hallways into storage areas. Gray chairs and two pianos line an interior hallway that has become more closet than walkway.

The addition will include 5,400 square feet of storage space on the ground level adjoining the existing storage area, along with a ticket booth. The project will nearly triple the amount of storage space in the building.

Atop the new storage area and level with the Show Me Center concourse, the university plans to build a patio and 2,500 square feet of offices for the basketball coaches.

The head coaches and assistant coaches currently are squeezed into offices on the building's south side, right next to the cramped offices of Ross and his 12 staff members.

"We don't have any space right now for ticket sellers to come in and work," said Ross. "We've been over the top of each other quite a bit."

Once the coaches move in to new quarters, Ross and his staff will take over the vacated offices.

Construction could begin this fall and be completed in a year, Ross said.

The project would be funded with $200,000 paid by Harry Crisp and his Pepsi-Cola Bottling Co. of Marion, Ill., as well as money from athletics fund raising, the Show Me Center reserves and the university. The $200,000 payment was part of a contract worked out last year that gives Crisp's company the exclusive contract for soft drinks served in the Show Me Center.

Southeast also wants to expand the $10 million Otto and Della Seabaugh Polytechnic Building, which is nearing completion on the north side of the campus. The 60,000-square-foot structure, which will house industrial arts classes, should be completed in about a month.

But university officials say it already needs to be expanded. The school administration has proposed a 6,600-square-foot addition on the northeast side of the building. It would house industrial and electronics labs as well as a multipurpose area.

Dr. Randy Shaw, dean of the School of Polytechnic Studies, said some of the added space would be used for training for area industries.

The project is expected to cost $921,000. It would be funded with one-time salary savings from unfilled positions and equipment funds, school officials said. Construction could begin by fall and be completed by next summer.

Other projects: n Construction of the residence hall just south of the University Center could begin later this year and be completed by the start of fall 2002 classes. It would house 300 students in four-person suites.

* Construction of the $319,543 River Campus Terrace Project, which will include a half mile of asphalt bicycle and pedestrian paths and a shelter on the grounds of the former St. Vincent's seminary overlooking the Mississippi River. Southeast recently obtained a $255,634 grant from the Missouri Department of Transportation.

* Design and initial site work for construction of the parking garage that would be built west of the Student Recreation Center on the north side of New Madrid Street. Southeast has received $650,000 in federal money for the project. The university will provide $162,500 from its parking fund.

The university hopes to get another $6 million in federal funding in the next few years to construct the parking structure.

The project could be done in phases, eventually providing 600 surface parking spaces and 1,200 spaces in the parking structure.