Butler Community College gets donation from Freddy’s co-founder to build its own culinary school
Butler Community College will soon have a new home for its culinary and hospitality program in Butler County.
The El Dorado-based college, which has been running a culinary and hospitality management program out of Boston Recreation Center at 6555 E. Zimmerly since 2012, has secured private donations that will allow it to erect a new building on a piece of land in front of the Dillons at Kellogg and Andover Road.
The money for the building project is being donated by Scott Redler — one of the co-founders of Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers chain — and his wife, Betsy, who have been involved in Butler’s culinary program since its start. Scott Redler and his partner recently sold majority ownership of the restaurant chain they founded in Wichita 18 years ago to Thompson Street Capital Partners . Scott Redler declined to say how much he had contributed to the Butler project.
The other donor is Vantage Point Properties Inc., a Wichita-based group headed by Paul Jackson, who owns the land on which Andover Marketplace sits.
The project was Scott Redler’s idea, and it’s something he’s been thinking about for some time, he said.
“Betsy and I are so extremely excited to be able to offer this to Butler,” he said. “Hospitality is something both of us have been involved in our whole lives, and giving back is something that’s important to us.”
Butler has been offering a hospitality program since the 1980s and culinary classes since 2000. It started its culinary program in 2012 and has since graduated dozens of students who are now working in restaurants all over the area.
The Redlers have been involved with the program for 25 years, Scott Redler said. Scott serves on the Culinary Advisory Committee, and Betsy is a member of the College’s Foundation Board of Directors. Three years ago, the couple also endowed the Betsy and Scott Redler Hospitality scholarship for the school’s hospitality students.
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Though they’re still working out details and don’t have an exact timeline for when the building might be complete, Redler said he hopes it’s “not that long.” When complete, the building will have space where students can put on private dinners for local residents throughout the year.
Their next step is to visit other comparably sized community colleges with similar buildings and gather design ideas, Redler said.
Outside the service area
Though Butler Community College’s culinary and hospitality program has been operating out of the Boston Recreation Center in Wichita for almost nine years, Sedgwick County is outside of Butler Community College’s “service area.” So Butler administrators were required by Kansas law and by Board of Regents policy to get approval from Wichita State University each year to teach classes there. WSU had been granting that approval since Butler started classes in Wichita.
But tension bubbled up three years ago when Butler put in a bid to move its program into an old brick fire station on South Topeka in Wichita and lease the building from a local developer, who would spend $4 million adding industrial kitchens, classrooms and offices.
When the plan was announced, WSU objected in the form of a cease-and-desist letter, saying it had long been considering plans to open its own culinary school through WSU Tech. Butler withdrew its plans and the two schools said they planned to discuss potential partnerships in the future.
Then, in December, WSU Tech announced that it would be moving forward with its own program. Its board of directors had approved a letter of intent to take over the old Henry’s department store building at 124 S. Broadway and turn it into a 45,000 square-foot facility that would feature not only kitchens and classroom space for the program but also a food hall, where the public could dine on items prepared by the students. A rooftop event center that organizations could rent and use the students as caterers would also be part of the plan.
WSU Tech President Sheree Utash said on Friday that those plans are still on track and that construction could start in the space in May or June of this year. The school is going through the process of getting Board of Regents approval for its plan but hopes to start offering classes in the space in August of 2022. It will enroll its first students this fall, though, and will offer classes in an “incubator” site until the new space is ready.
Their plan is to create “a very urban culinary and hospitality institute,” Utash said, and long-term plans include the addition of a sommelier and a beer brewing program. They’re also in the process of securing four to five vendors for the school’s food hall.
Butler president Kim Krull said she was excited that the two donations would allow her school to continue with and even expand its own program. Since Butler’s longtime lead instructors John and Lexi Michael departed late last year to accept jobs with WSU’s new culinary and hospitality program, longtime chef Gregory Cole has been leading the program.
Krull said that the school won’t have WSU’s approval to teach classes at the Boston Recreation Center after July. But if the City of Wichita allows the program to remain in the center while its new building is underway, it would consider teaching classes without state funding and take a loss. If they can’t stay, they’ll find another spot where they can continue, she said.
As to whether the Wichita area can support two culinary programs, Krull said “that remains to be seen.”
We’ve been in place for years and years,” she said. “It’s an outstanding program that’s highly recognized, and we don’t plan to shut it down.”
This story was originally published April 4, 2021 at 5:01 AM.
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