But with supporters trying to keep the homey coffeehouse next door to campus, College of Education associate dean Paul Kingery, who negotiated the lease for the YMCA building at 1810 University Ave., told proprietor Dennis Suyeoka he could ask the regents to allow a sublease.

"People like coming here because it reminds them of old-time Hawai'i," said Suyeoka, who opens at 7:30 a.m. weekdays and 9 a.m. weekends. "It's the only alternative that isn't fast food in the (immediate) university area."

The coffeehouse has been there for 18 years. Suyeoka said he serves around 50 or more customers daily.

He whips up omelettes for breakfast and lasagna for lunch that customers eat in a courtyard bounded by palms and bamboo. Students say it's one of the most affordable places around; professors liken it to a faculty club.

"We don't have a faculty club, so in some ways this is an approximation," said economics professor James Roumasset, who settled down under a ceiling fan for a cup of Indonesia java as soon as he got back this week from a conference in Venice.

Although Suyeoka said YMCA management told him the Y would be happy to see the college sublease to Coffeeline, YMCA president Don Anderson said "the original intention was not to have him (Suyeoka) stay."

"We'd like to develop a closer relationship with the College of Education and this is one way to do it," said Anderson. "They're in desperate need of space."

Anderson said it will be up to the College of Education whether Coffeeline stays or goes — and "he is petitioning to stay."

For customers such as lawyer Joe Mottl, who has dropped in several times a week on his way to work for the past eight years, the low-key atmosphere plus free copies of The New York Times, Atlantic Monthly and New Yorker make up an oasis.

"This is the closest good cup of coffee to home," he said, easing into a couch yesterday to do some paperwork while eating a bagel with Suyeoka's sun-dried tomato topping. "And it's a nice interface of people — scientists, architects, economists, attorneys, students. But it's a small footprint and never really crowded."

When his avocado tree is bearing, Mottl will drop off a basket. Or at Christmas, he'll bring in persimmons from his mother's tree on Maui. "People often bring in baskets of fruit," he says.

Political science graduate student Luukia Archer, 26, likes to stop in for lunch in the hidden courtyard with its palms and bamboo. She finds the food "a lot better than the campus food."

History graduate student Danny Simon, also 26, said he discovered Coffeeline only recently but has returned every day. "It's open-air, the food is amazing, and the music's not too loud," said Simon.

Anderson said the Y will put $40,000 to $50,000 in renovations into the building for the College of Education's use, for electrical upgrades and to make areas accessible for people with disabilities. It doesn't include enclosing the Coffeeline space.

In looking for leasable office space, the College of Education will move the Center for Disability Studies and the Curriculum Research and Development Group. Lease rent will be $141,480 annually, with payments coming from federal research money.

Suyeoka pays around $900 a month in rent and says he can't afford to move anywhere else because rents in nearby Mo'ili'ili are as high as $2,000.

The second floor of the building was once occupied by a charter school that has moved out, said Anderson. The floor is already divided into offices.