Sacramento State President Alexander Gonzalez met with the Union WELL Inc. Board of Directors Monday to explain his decision for not approving the expansion of the University Union and WELL, which would have raised the Union fee for spring 2014.

Instead, Gonzalez said he has decided to revise the plans to exclude the event center and to focus on expanding the Union and the WELL.

University Union Executive Director Leslie Davis will be overseeing the expansion process as it moves forward.

“We’re going to continue with the alternative consultation process into the spring and design an expansion of the Union and the WELL,” Davis said. “March would be our target time so that [if there is] a fee increase the students [can] approve it and the president approves it for fall.”

The first phase of the expansion plan cost the university $72,000, which includes an architect and operating budget. During Monday’s meeting, the board requested $63,000 and approved the second phase of the expansion project.

Criminal justice major Vika Katiuzhinsky, 18, said she did not vote in the initial survey, but was pleased to hear the president’s decision.

“I think it’s actually a good move just because our tuition rates won’t rise and I do work about 12 hours a week and that’s actually a lot of time that I can be using for studying,” Katiuzhinsky said. “So I guess it’s good that tuition won’t come up because if it does I have to work more. That’s less time to study. My grades [would] drop [and] school will be pointless.”

Business major Clark Cowgill, 24, said he is interested in seeing the Union expansion, but does not have much interest in it.

“I’m a graduating senior so it wouldn’t really matter to me too much if this place got bigger or not,” Cowgill said. “I’m almost never on campus [because] I commute. I’m only here one day a week, but I guess if it would help out other students I would be all for it.”

Along with the expansion, the board approved policy updates, which included a no smoking or vapor emission policy for both the Union and the WELL.

Davis said the next board meeting in February will focus on the next steps for the expansion.

“There won’t be anything else done until we do the alternative consultation,” Davis said.