CD: MSU expanding through improvements, new projects

JULY 14, 2009

JORDAN NOVET

STARKVILLE — A drive around Mississippi State University this summer reveals the fact slowly but surely: The campus is awash with construction.

Current projects can be separated into two categories: improvement and establishment. In the improvement category, the university is expanding its water heating and cooling loop and renovating several aging buildings. And in the way of establishment, the school is on its way to creating a new parking lot and erecting a couple new buildings.

The man who oversees the logistics and planning of construction at the school, Tim Muzzi, gave an impromptu tour of the campus Monday and a few details about each project on it.

Muzzi, the university architect, said he was excited to get about campus and give the tour — bureaucracy dominates his schedule — even though he’s very busy.

“You know,” said Muzzi, summing up the work, “everything we do here is for the benefit of the students’ health, safety and welfare.”

Navigating the campus in a white Ford Windstar reserved for facilities management business, Muzzi, who graduated from the university’s School of Architecture in 1979, first pointed out the Lloyd-Ricks Building, home of MSU’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

“It’s under renovation,” he said. “It’s a Mississippi landmark.”

Read complete article at Commercial Dispatch.