Negotiations for a new dining services provider at Western Kentucky University are tightening as officials are now talking with just one potential provider.

“I think we’re getting close to completing the negotiations,” said Ken Baushke, WKU’s supply chain management director, who’s also involved with a committee navigating the process.

Baushke said the university is negotiating with one dining services provider but declined to name the provider. He estimated arriving at a final decision for awarding the 20-year contract within the next month or so.

Baushke described the contract discussions as “fairly complex.” He put a dollar amount figure for the contract between $18 million and $20 million annually.

“Other than construction, it’s the largest contract that we have,” he said.

He said the university is mainly interested in “trying to keep the cost of meals reasonable for the students, providing healthy food choices for our students (and) nice comfortable facilities for dining.”

WKU’s partnership with its current dining services provider Aramark goes back to 1997, and since that time the university has expanded its dining options to more than 20 campus restaurants by reinvesting profits earned off the deal.

Requiring the provider to reinvest isn’t going away, Baushke said. A big part of the deal is getting the provider to sign onto financing upgrades for WKU’s aging Garrett Conference Center, which dates to 1951. The building at the top of WKU’s hill houses a food court and a Distance Learning and Testing Center

Bryan Russell, WKU’s chief facilities officer, called the building “tired.”

“It’s time to do a total refresh of the building,” Russell said, adding that means electrical and mechanical upgrades.

Russell said specific adjustments for Garrett haven’t yet been identified. WKU’s brought in a firm from Owensboro to assist with initial planning, he said.

“All we have done to date is we’ve had a feasibility study done by Hafer and Associates and some concepts,” he said. “All that is subject to change.”

In the meantime, Russell said the university is waiting for guidance from incoming President Timothy Caboni, who will replace retiring President Gary Ransdell in July.

“The official process probably won’t start until then,” he said of getting the Garrett project officially going.

WKU was accepting proposals from three competitors in October of last year, according to previous Daily News coverage. At the time, those competitors included Sodexo, Chartwells K12 and Aramark.

WKU outsourced about 200 of its building services associates and grounds employees to Sodexo last year as part of a budget cut totaling more than $6 million.

Brian Kuster, vice president for student affairs, manages dining services. He declined to comment in an interview beyond saying that the university intends soon to enter into a letter of intent, which would outline the deal, with a provider. He said the university had been considering two vendors, Sodexo and Aramark, but declined to say which one will win the contract.

Overall, Baushke expects the pace of the process to pick up.

“We should be getting things going here,” he said.