SHSU Leases Land To HEARTS Museum

The Huntsville Item reports (Aug. 30) about the university and HEARTS Veterans museum's plan for the land along northbound Interstate 45:

At last Thursday’s meeting of the Texas State University System Board of Regents, a lease agreement was approved between the university and the museum that grants the museum about 5 acres of the university’s land that sits adjacent to the property.

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice gave the more than 80 acres to the university in the last legislative session.

A walkway will be built between the Innovation Plaza and the HEARTS Museum. The walkway would be where the Vietnam Memorial currently is and would allow easy access between the two locations.

Innovation Plaza is part of a plan long in the making that would move CMIT and LEMIT from the SHSU main campus to that location. It will also include other buildings.

The master plan for the development was also approved at the latest regents meeting.

There are three priority projects that will be the focus of the first five years of the projects.

The first is the transfer of the CMIT/LEMIT facilities. The program calls for an 83,0000 square-foot building.

The second is a six-story hotel and conference center. The hotel would hold 250 beds in a 175,000-square-foot facility and an accompanying 20,000-square-foot conference center.

The third would be a 47,500-square-foot facility that would provide correctional training for TDCJ. The goal of that building is to provide pre-service training for cadets and provide continuing education for TDCJ leadership. The new building will be built by SHSU and leased back to TDCJ.

That building would include academic training rooms, housing accommodations for up to 150 cadets, as well as a gym and mock unit block.

Phase 2 of the project includes building a university life commons after the plaza has reached “a reasonable level of development,” according to the master plan.

This will include areas for studying, dining and other activities at the heart of the location.

That phase also includes a simulation building that would allow for many different types of corrections training scenarios, which could include cell arrangements, dorm rooms, a day room and dining rooms.