UNC to take over State Farm building

University will take possession in October 2003

EVANS — The University of Northern Colorado will soon have a new building to add to its campus, but still has to figure out what to do with it.

Three years ago, State Farm Insurance sold its 270,000-square-foot office building in Evans to Westfield Development Properties in Greeley, said Nick Gregory, State Farm manager of administrative services.

Westfield later donated the building to UNC through the UNC Foundation, said Cheryl Crouch, president of development for the foundation.

That the university needs the space is not in question. What still needs to be decided is what will go into the sleek brick building — long a landmark at the intersection of U.S. highways 85 and 34.

It’s still too early to say if UNC will hold classes in the structure or use it for administrative purposes. “We’re supposed to take over in (October 2003),´ said Crouch. “We’re going to put together a committee to explore what will go in. It could be the university will keep it for itself, it might be partially private investment or it might be all private investment. We just don’t know right now.”

Crouch said the biggest advantage the building gives the university is flexibility. “It lets us be flexible in office space or classroom space,” she said.

The building is about two miles southeast of the main UNC campus.

Bob Hetzel, UNC’s assistant vice president for auxiliary services, said the building is the first to be gifted to the university in the last 10 to 15 years and the biggest ever donated.

Don Slack, executive vice president of Westfield, said the company donated the building to UNC to establish a relationship with the school and because it made sense. “It’s a matter of validating our options for the disposal of the property,´ said Slack. “We could have put the building on the market, but UNC had a need and State Farm and (university president) Hank Brown had many conversations about it.”

Slack said the building is valued at between $10 million and $11 million.

Over time, Slack said he thinks the donation and the presence of both State Farm and Con Agra can get UNC interested in the Promontory development as well. “There will be research and training needs there,´ said Slack. “UNC might do classes out there. They might also do some training. There are all kinds of opportunities to create the synergy that we discussed.”

Bruce Eisenhauer, Evans city manager, said the building is a landmark in Evans, one of the more-distinctive structures in the town of about 10,000.

Gregory said State Farm will vacate the building “sometime between April and June” of 2003. Employees are being moved about 10 miles west into a 470,000-square-foot, three-building campus at the Promontory development. State Farm used the Evans building as a claims operations center for Colorado, Wyoming and Utah.

Gregory said two additions have been made to the building since State Farm, headquartered in Bloomington, Ill., established a regional office in Evans in 1963.

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