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OU President Joe Harroz, flanked by university regents Michael Cawley and Frank Keating, discusses university business during a May 27, 2021 Board of Regents meeting.Emma Keith / The Transcript
After a year of pivoting its priorities to COVID-19 response, the University of Oklahomaâs leadership was able focus Thursday on a number of initiatives that will advance OUâs long term goals and vision.
The universityâs board approved a strategic plan-heavy agenda during its Thursday meeting. The plan, though never released to the public in its entirety, focuses heavily on making OU âa top-tier research university,â and outlines academic and cultural goals for OU over the years and decades ahead.
OU has reached an agreement with Provident Oklahoma Education Resources, Inc. to transfer ownership of the Cross Village complex to the university, clearing the way for OU freshmen to live in the complex and accelerating replacement of the towers.
According to a Wednesday email from OU President Joseph Harroz, Cross will be considered a university on-campus living property starting in fall 2021, and all outstanding litigation between the university and Provident Oklahoma, the owner of Cross Village and a non-profit subsidiary of Provident Resources that financed Crossâs development, has been resolved.Â
âNow, with Cross Village available for freshmen this fall, we can start the demolition process of Adams Tower this summer,â Harroz wrote in the email. â(The purchase allows OU) to accelerate the replacement of Adams Tower by four years.â
A University of Oklahoma banner hangs on the Norman campus.
The University of Oklahoma is partnering with the Chickasaw Nation to fully acquire Cross Village, the embattled upperclassmen living facility that will now offer the university a fall housing solution.
The Chickasaw Nationâs Sovereign Properties Holdco, LLC will pick up the land lease for Cross and lease the complex to OU until the university âsecures its own financing,â according to OU.
The acquisition of Cross feeds into OUâs larger plan for freshman housing, announced and approved at a Board of Regents meeting in March.
OU plans to replace Walker, Couch and Adams towers, decades-old freshman housing structures that have reportedly experienced significant mold problems in recent years. OU President Joe Harroz said at the March 5 regents meeting that heâs not yet sure what the replacement housing will look like, but that OU has contracted an architectural firm to guide the process.
March 10, 2020 at Norman, Oklahoma
The University of Oklahoma Board of Regents Norman Campus Committee will meet for a Special Meeting at the Bizzell Memorial Library, Room LL118, 401 W. Brooks Street, on the Norman campus on March 10, 2020 at 10:30 a.m. Active discussion will be held on the 2020-21 Student Activity Fee Budget – NC, Agenda Item #19, and for information only discussion of Naming Rights in Sarkeys Fitness Center. No final action will be taken by this committee. There may be other Board members in attendance at this meeting in addition to the committee membership. All findings or conclusions of this committee are subject to the approval of the full Board of Regents. A copy of the agenda can be found at this link.