January 2017 Newsletter

Chili's is Officially Open

After a couple of years of planning and months of construction, Chili's opened at the east end of Noble Hall on Monday, January 9, 2017.  A ribbon-cutting celebration was held prior to the opening.  The restaurant is a full-service Chili's seating 125 indoors, another 75 outdoors, and serving up all your favorites.  

Faculty and staff can use CatCash at Chili's to pay for food; you cannot use it to purchase alcohol or leave a tip. WCU students with meal plans will be able to use their declining balance, or exchange meals, to dine.  

Parking and Transportation Update

Retail businesses are now open in the bottom of Noble Hall.  As part of this project, Parking and Transportation has opened two new meter areas (lot #75 and nine parallel spaces in front of Noble) that will be monitored from 7am-11pm seven days a week.  Both meters will take credit/debit cards as well as CatCards. Lot #75 is $1.00 per 30 minutes and is located on the East end of Noble next to Chili’s.  For the nine parallel spaces in front of Noble, the rate is 25 cents per 20 minutes with a 20 minute limit. 

Noble residents now also have two 30 minute loading zones available next to the dumpster in the Methodist Church Lot (lot #65).

Review Your Deductions in the New Year

The January paycheck will reflect changes made to health insurance, NC Flex, and withholdings for the new year. Please take a look at your January paycheck to make sure you have the correct deductions. If you find that there is an error, please get in touch with Human Resources (828-227-7218) as soon as possible.

Community Service Leave

Did you know you get 24 hours of community service leave every year? Employees can use their community service leave to volunteer for non-profit organizations, schools, and other community activities. If you’ve always wanted to volunteer for a cause, remember you can use your leave to do it! Let’s make 2017 the year we give back to our community, one community service day at a time.

To check your service leave balance, visit the employee section of myWCU and select "check leave balances." For questions about community service leave and using this time, contact the Human Resources office at 828-227-7218.

State of Sustainability Forum

DISCOVER CAMPUS SUSTAINABILITY!  Have you ever wondered how much energy we consume and what efforts are being taken to reduce our carbon footprint? Do you want to know what is recyclable and how we are revamping our campus waste reduction program?

In the past 15 years, we have reduced our energy usage by 42% and avoided over $25M in energy costs through conservation measures.  Over the last five years our recycling volume has increased by 85%.  If you would like to know how we achieved this, learn about future goals, and how to make a positive impact everyday then consider this opportunity.

Please join us on February 15th from 3:30pm-4:30pm in the UC Theatre for a campus wide open forum hosted by Staff Senate and the Office of Sustainability and Energy Management.  We will explore our current state of sustainability, energy management, and recycling at WCU. This will be followed by a panel discussion with campus experts to field questions and gather input to help guide our future.

We are a university defined by its people. Let’s build a community that fosters a sustainable future.  Together we can transform WCU!