AU Auxiliary Services has confirmed that STA Travel, the on-campus travel agency, will not renew its contract with AU. However, this decision will not be confirmed by the STA Travel Corporation until December.
Hillary Dallas, Auxiliary Services director of Retail and Leasing Operations, confirmed that the decision to end the lease was initiated by the travel agency.
"The initial lease term expires at the end of July," Dallas said, "So we had discussions with the corporate office who then said they did not want to renew the location's contract."
However, Jared Klein, director of Real Estate and Purchasing at STA Travel's corporate office in Los Angeles, declined to comment on the branch's closing.
"At this present time, we are not obligated to comment publicly on this decision until December," Klein said. "When we make the decision official in December it will be more clear regarding what STA Travel is doing."
ATV News reported in mid-September that the travel agency would close, which Chadd Rittenbaugh, the AU branch manager, disspelled.
Rittenbaugh instead said that the corporation was closing stores in downtown D.C., at College Park, Md., and at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
"They evaluated all the offices in this region and there was overlap," Rittenbaugh previously told The Eagle. "All the offices were under the microscope."
STA Travel has helped students to book trips home and abroad for the past five years. Auxiliary Services and the University Center Project Team are currently working together in search of what type of business will fill the Tunnel's vacancy.
According to Michael Elmore, senior director of the University Center, Dallas had brought the issue forward at the University Center's Project Team meetings.
"When leases expire, Auxiliary Services brings the vacancy issue to us," Elmore said.
The Project Team is composed of various members of AU faculty, staff and students, including the Student Confederation.
"As a team we're in the process of getting feedback from the campus community," Elmore said. "Their ideas will help determine the direction of the process."
In September, the Project Team organized an online survey on the university's Web portal asking the AU community for ideas and opinions. The survey received more than 400 responses and offered a raffle with $50 in EagleBuck$ as the prize for those who participated.
Bernard Schultz, special assistant to the vice president of Campus Life, largely organized the survey and was impressed by the campus response.
"With STA Travel not renewing its lease, it presented us with an opportunity to see what the community wants us to put in that space," Schultz said.
The survey was organized into different categories of possible ventures, which included additional food services, entertainment businesses, health and beauty stores, and other modes of merchandising.
"Right now," Schultz added, "we're in the process of pooling together all that survey information."
Student opinions across campus as to what should replace the travel agency include fast food eateries, pharmacies, video stores, computer labs and dry cleaners. After the surveying process is completed, the new consensus will present a firmer possibility for what will fill the possible STA Travel vacancy. As the process progresses, the University Center Project Team and Auxiliary Services will continue to pursue the issue.
