Wilkes University Takes Possession of Call Center

Aug. 9–WILKES-BARRE — Wilkes University plans to relocate its campus security force to South Main Street by the end of the year as it renovates the former call center.

Wilkes will move its Public Safety Office from the corner of South and River streets to the first floor of the Park ‘N’ Lock South garage, part of the call center complex the school purchased from the city for $7.9 million.

University students and faculty will immediately begin using the 600-spot parking garage as crews make nearly $2 million in renovations on the call center across the street.

The school plans to augment its security staff of 10 full-time officers with two part-time officers to expand its 24-hour coverage zone to include the call center, said university spokeswoman Christine Seitzinger.

Vacant since 2002 when the telemarketing tenant of the city-owned building ceased operations, the call center will become the “University Center on Main” and house administrative offices, continuing-education classrooms and an indoor practice area.

Use of the athletic facilities in the 80,000-square-foot building could begin by January, and offices and classrooms will be completed by next summer, university officials said.

The expansion increases the size of campus by about 10 percent and is part of a 20-year plan that university officials say is an effort to reorient the university toward the city’s riverfront and Main Street.

A 3,500-square-foot area fronting South Main Street may be converted to retail space, and the university is exploring leasing agreements with national coffee and bagel chains, school officials said.

At a symbolic transfer of ownership Monday — the transaction was finalized last week — Mayor Tom Leighton and university President Tim Gilmour praised the deal as mutually beneficial.

“It’s really a win-win situation,” Gilmour said.

For the city, selling the failed call center eased a significant financial burden that had hindered efforts to refinance the city’s pension bond.

“We are one of the few cities across this country that has ever defaulted on a bond,” Leighton said.

In 2002, the city defaulted on a bond taken to finance the construction of the building, forcing AMBAC, the New York-based bond insurer, to cover a $220,000 payment for the call center.

When the city went to AMBAC in 2004 to underwrite a $35 million pension bond, “they laughed at us,” Leighton said. “They said, ‘Buddy you got a long way to go.’”

With the financial weight of the vacant building off the city’s shoulders, Leighton expects the pension bond to be refinanced in the coming weeks.

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