After many years in Brighton and Alpine Halls, the History and Government Departments will be forced to relocate their offices to the third floor of Tahoe Hall in January, and some people are not happy about it.

“We like our building and we like our location,” said Mignon Gregg, chair of the Government Department. “We are not necessarily happy with the conditions in Tahoe Hall.”

The move is a result of a 1988 revised master plan calling for the removal of the outdated two-story buildings which are located in the middle of campus. The buildings, which include Douglass, Calaveras, Brighton and Alpine Halls, are tentatively scheduled to be torn down by 2007 to create a lawn that runs through the center of campus.

Although the buildings may not be removed for another six years, the departments are being asked to move now because the space in Tahoe has been freed up due to the relocation of the Department of Social Work in the new Mariposa Hall, according to Howard Harris, associate vice-president of Facilities Management.

“If we don?t move now, we may not have a place to go,” said George Craft, chair of the History Department. “It?s not necessarily all bad, but there are some serious disadvantages.”

One disadvantage involves Tahoe?s lack of classroom space. Currently, both history and government are able to hold most classes in their respective buildings. The lack of space in Tahoe means that this will no longer be possible.

The current arrangement is comfortable because the faculty are right next to their classes, Gregg said.

While the Government and History Departments have been able to keep their offices and classes together, “it?s not the norm on this campus for classes to be in close proximity to faculty,” said Joseph Sheley, dean of the College of Social Sciences and Interdisciplinary Studies.

“What we?ll do out of fairness is go through all of our departments and distribute the distance from faculty to classes evenly so that no one will carry more of a load,” Sheley said.

The History and Government Departments will be sharing the third floor of Tahoe with Economics, Ethnic Studies, and California Studies. All these departments fall under the College of Social Sciences and Interdisciplinary Studies, with the exception of history, which is in the College of Arts and Letters.

The move places all the departments in the College of Social Sciences and Interdisciplinary Studies, with the exception of Anthropology and Family and Consumer Sciences, on the south end of campus.

“What that does is create a lot of interaction for our faculty,” Sheley said. “Overall, on balance, this is good for the college.”

Another advantage to the move is that there is more room in Tahoe as far as square footage. Faculty and staff who currently share office space with at least one other person will have their own offices in Tahoe.

In addition, the History Department has been able to keep a general-purpose room in Brighton that will hold maps and allow for professor/student conferences.

“There?s a lot of opposition about it,” Craft said. However, “the comfortable majority said let?s just go ahead and move.”