Campus Dining Services is due for a makeover.

Proposed changes for next year include shuttering Talcott, pioneering a lunch cart in the Science Center, returning takeout service to Dascomb, opening the Rathskellar in the evenings and closing DeCafé at 9 p.m. daily.

The tentative changes, presented by CDS Director Jack Cahill to the Housing and Dining Committee, drew mixed responses. All committee members urged CDS to reconsider closing DeCafé early. CDS said they hoped to shift the night staff from DeCafé to the Rathskellar so students could use the prepared food line in the Rat, which would stay open until 1 a.m.

“We have been hearing all year that people want the Rat reopened at night,” Cahill remarked. “We’re doing this based on what students have told us.” The committee responded by hinting that input to reopen the Rat was in the wake of fourth meal’s move to Dascomb, not as a substitute to DeCafé.

Cahill said that his office would reconsider the plans, but said that the Student Union, which runs Wilder, would also have a say on the issue. He stressed that there was no possibility that fourth meal would be moved back to the Rat.

“We’ve seen that 35 percent more students eat at Dascomb than at the Rat last year,” he said.

Another likely change will affect the way meals are purchased at Dascomb. Food next year will be charged on an a la carte, or item by item, basis. Board meals will be assigned a certain value amount that can then be spent on individual purchases. Cahill said that each board meal would grant a student between $7 and $8 to spend, and assured “nobody is going to leave the dining hall hungry.”

With the current all-you-can-eat system, students opting for takeout can stockpile enough food for several meals, something CDS cannot afford.
“Food costs fell by 70 percent after the takeout program was ended at Dascomb a year ago,” Cahill said.

The most innovative part of the CDS proposal is a lunch cart that will stand in the atrium of the Science Center and be open from 7:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. The menu items will include prepackaged sandwiches and other light snacks. Food will be available for purchase through Flex.

“If people still want handmade salads or prepared sandwiches with extra mayo, they’re still going to go to the DeCafé,” Cahill said, stressing that the lunch cart will offer packaged items only. “But we feel having this open during the lunch hour will reduce stress on the traditional dining halls.”

The most drastic but expected measure — the closure of Talcott — was met with reluctant approval by the committee.

“If we decide we want the cart in the Science Center and the services in Wilder, we will need to close Talcott,” CDS Associate Director Michelle Gross said. “Those are absolutely connected.”

After the presentation, some in the committee voiced concern that CDS had chosen a path toward more Flex options that students would not be able to afford.

“When I was a freshman, the grocery was this small, useless thing and we had plenty of Flex,” Student Senator Tom Simchak said. “Now we have lots more options and not enough Flex.”

Cahill responding by saying he hoped the next options would “give a lot more flexibility and benefit to students.”

No reductions in board plan Flex allotments will be made next year, he said in closing. “I really don’t think there’s any chance that the board plan is going to change.”