PATIO CAFE UPHEAVAL

Students starved for dining options in UHCL cafeteria

Courtney Bowen
The Signal
Grille Works, Home Zone and Bene Pizza are gone. Montague’s Deli replaced Quiznos. Java City and Montague’s Deli are now the only dining options left at the Patio Cafe.

At the Student Government Association open forum held Aug. 30, students voiced concerns that Home Zone, Grille Works and Bene Pizza had been taken away without warning. The closure, which occurred after the final 2010-2011 Food Service Committee meeting, left no opportunity for committee members to discuss student needs.

Students, faculty and staff now have even more limited options left here on campus than they had before, those who attended the forum expressed. If they want anything else besides what is available at Cappuccino Bono and the Patio Cafe, they will have to look elsewhere; spending time, money and transportation costs. Students offered suggestions such as hot plates, pizza and a salad bar as food services they would enjoy on campus, as well as franchises already in place at other University of Houston System campuses such as Taco Bell, Chick-Fil-A and Pizza Hut. Students questioned why these options are not available at UHCL.

“SGA is very involved in the situation,” said Henry Hodde, SGA president. “We actually place students on the Food Service Advisory Committee here at UHCL.” Right now, the committee is trying to settle on a date for their first meeting of the year.

“This meeting will be a big one, since ARAMARK representatives will be in attendance so we can field questions and concerns to them directly. On top of that meeting, I am trying to set up a meeting exclusively for SGA Executive Council with Debra Carpenter, executive director of procurement at UHCL,” Hodde said.

Carpenter has contact with local representatives of AßRAMARK Corporation, the food service provider for the UH System, because her role as executive director of procurement involves negotiating with contract services.

Attempts to contact representatives of ARAMARK proved unsuccessful; however, Carpenter supplied a response from ARAMARK stating that Grille Works, Home Zone and Bene Pizza had low customer numbers, and responses to the dining survey sent out in May 2011 had those same three locations as the top contenders for replacement.

“However, replace does not mean eliminate entirely,” said Jonathan Zophy, UHCL history professor and member of the Food Service Committee. “And who makes such radical changes just based on a survey, which itself was not analyzed or discussed by the Food Service Committee?”

ARAMARK owns Montague’s Deli, Java City, Grille Works, Home Zone and Bene Pizza. ARAMARK replaced Quiznos with Montague’s Deli, stating it offered “comparable healthy option and the variety needed to offer the university community choices at a competitive price.”

“We should be expanding our food options, [salad bar, international foods] not contracting them,” Zophy said.

Montague’s Deli occupies the previous Quiznos location, and uses some of the same equipment, including the cooler for salads and fruit cups that still bear the Quiznos ‘Q’ and the toasting oven.

“My advise to the students is to relax and eat up,” Hodde said. “I have personally tried Montague’s Deli and I am not disappointed at all. The sandwiches are good and they offer a wide variety of sides as well. Now, as far as the issues concerning variety of vendors and service, I would advice students to speak up and let their voices be heard. This can be done by attending SGA meetings or just emailing us directly. We are currently keeping a tally of all complaints from students on campus, so that when we meet the administration for decision-making time, we will have the students’ voices in hand.”

SGA meets weekly on Tuesdays at 11:30 a.m. at the SSCB Lecture Hall during the fall and spring semesters. The executive council can be contacted via SGA@uhcl.edu, or individually: HoddeH@uhcl.edu, Hopson@uhcl.edu, AjazWa@uhcl.edu, and ChandraS@uhcl.edu.

“Montague’s Deli, with its mediocre bread is not an improvement over Quiznos in my judgment,” Zophy said. “I hope the committee can meet soon to begin the process of fixing this.”