Sacramento State will soon be housing California Northstate University College of Health Science on the third floor of Folsom Hall.

CNU will be subleasing the entire third floor of Folsom Hall, paying Sac State about $1 million in rent per year.

The sublease, according to Mike Lee, vice president and chief financial officer of Administration and Business Affairs for Sac State, is set for 10 years.

“That income can then be used to do whatever we want at the university,” said Lee.

Even though subleasing Folsom Hall will generate extra income for Sac State, many faculty members are concerned that CNU’s Health Science program will be in direct competition with Sac State’s.

“It was a complete surprise, we didn’t know anything about it,” said Interim Chair for Kinesiology and Health Science, Steve Gray. “It is a concern. We don’t know any details. We would just like to find out what they committed too, what they have done, what kind of programs are actually going in there, do they have programs that are in direct competition.”

Though the programs are in the same field and will be housed under the same roof, General Counsel for California Northstate University, Paul J. Wagstaffe says there are differences between the two.

“The CNU program is different from CSUS,” Wagstaffe said. “CSUS stands to benefit from the sublease. It’s positive for all concerned.”

Sac State primarily teaches nursing, a program that is impacted. CNU will prepare students going into pre-medical fields.

“My understanding is that the CNU program is focused on pre-medical preparation with heavy emphasis on sciences,” said Lee. “CNU has a pharmacy school and is in the process of starting a medical school offering MD. This undergraduate program is designed to be mainly a pipeline for their medical programs.”

According to Lee, the third floor of Folsom Hall had to be rented out to a “non-Sac State entity” by a required bonding agreement when the building was purchase.

Sac Sate had listed out the third floor of Folsom Hall for a few years now and CNU has been the only viable tenant.

“From the finance perspective, increased revenues for the university is better than sitting on the empty space,” said Lee in an email.