NEWS 2
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Last stop for grad student U-Pass
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A battle with bloodthirsty bed bugs at the McEown Park residences
NEWS 3
Paralympian Lisa Franks explains how she beat the odds
SPORTS 7
14 February, 2013 | The University of Saskatchewan student newspaper since 1912
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CULTURE 14
OPINIONS 16
NEWS
Students’ council green-lights overhaul of Browsers
Early renderings of the upcoming makeover to the Memorial Union Building. The mock-ups were presented to council Feb. 1 to provide a rough sketch of what the finished space could look like.
DARYL HOFMANN Senior News Editor Browsers Café will unveil an entirely new look and name this summer after more than a decade selling books and operating as a coffee house. The University of Saskatchewan Students’ Union has approved a $725,000 renovation that will transform the top floor of the Memorial Union Building into a modern restaurant and café by day and versatile event space by night. The project will be funded using
the USSU student infrastructure fee, which levies $111 each year from full-time undergraduates and $55 each year from undergraduates taking fewer than three courses per term. Construction is expected to begin early April and finish by mid-May, taking just six weeks. The union hopes to capitalize on the demand for a venue that can host weddings, banquets, performance art and campus club bookings, says USSU Business and Services Manager Jason Kovitch. “The existing business plan of
Browsers saw a decline in book sales of 30 to 40 per cent over the last few years and we knew that was sort of drifting away from us,” Kovitch said at the Feb. 1 University Students’ Council meeting. “At the same time, we didn’t have a coffee business that could exist on its own and generate the type of revenue we need to sustain that space.” In fact, revenue gleaned from book sales at Browsers has nosedived from about $350,000 in 2003 to just $100,000 in 2011, according to a financial spreadsheet
obtained last year by the Sheaf. For the current fiscal year, Browsers is projected to sink nearly $18,000 into the red. The renovation will rid the space of its large bookshelves, add booth seating and relocate the bar that snakes along the side of the space to the far back near the washrooms. The new bar will include coolers for bottled drinks, four draft beer taps, food displays, an espresso machine and a small oven. Customers will be served at their table and food will be brought upstairs from Louis’. In addition,
supplied: sepw architecture
there will be a handful of shortorder items exclusive to the upstairs, such as grilled paninis, salads, pizzas and baking. Self-serve coffee will no longer be available. In recent years, Browsers has averaged about $90,000 annually in food and beverage sales. “We’re quite confident that within the first year... we will be able to double that,” Kovitch said, adding that events like weddings and holiday parties can sometimes bring in up to $10,000 each.
Browsers’ overhaul
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CULTURE
Atkings dismantles the traditional exhibit
AZZEDINE ISSA Tyson John Atkings has invited his audience to help themselves at his upcoming exhibition, To Whom it May Concern, taking place Feb. 25 through Mar. 1. The BFA candidate’s graduating exhibit, on display at the Gordon Snelgrove Art Gallery, will open with over 60 pieces of Atkings’ hand-worked monotype prints covering the walls. Waiting to be discovered underneath these prints is the actual installation, which Atkings has painted on the wall. He has asked his audience to take pieces off the wall in order to unveil the painted walls beneath. For Atkings, the invitation to freely take his artwork is a manifestation of his frustrations with the recent events occurring in universities across the country.
Atkings continued on
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Tyson John Atkings surrounded by his prints.
t.j.atkings