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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 6, 1998)
Director seeks input from facultv By Michael Hines Student Activities Reporter There is a gulf between Univer sity Housing and faculty, and stu dents are in the middle. This is according to Mike Eyster, director of University Housing. The gulf was not created by design, he said, but it does exist. Faculty are busy with classes and research, and housing is busy with providing good service, he said. And now it is time to elimi nate that gulf. Housing will expand the Hon ors Hall program to involve more students and faculty from the Robert D. Clark Honors College. More students want an academic environment, Eyster said, and housing plans to comply. But housing has larger questions. “What do they think University Housing should be?” asked Eyster. He will begin to have such ques tions answered after meeting with several faculty organizations in coming weeks. Eyster said he rarely has a chance to speak with faculty, but when he does they often ask ques tions about residence hall life. Faculty should understand how students live, Eyster said, and housing needs to understand the faculty. By working with faculty mem bers, Eyster said he hopes to in volve housing throughout the Uni versity. “With the University’s efforts at retention and recruitment, every body is interested in doing any thing we can to attract and main tain students at the University,” he said. "Certainly, University Housing can play a significant role in recruiting and retention. I want to take advantage of this heightened interest to bridge the gap in involving faculty in Uni versity Housing.” Eyster said he wants to know the faculty’s picture of the ideal resi dential campus. He believes that with dialogue, services on both sides of the gulf could improve. Housing: Changes could hurt greeks m Continued from Page 1 upgrade our buildings,” Eyster said. Housing wi11 not lose any paying residents after the rent increase, Eyster said. It offers one of the best rental values in Eugene, he said, and the early indication is that oc cupancy should be strong next year. Residents will not be happy with the change, said Josh Gree nough, chair of the Residence Hall Governance Committee. "I don’t like it, and I know the students aren’t going to like it,” he said, “but what do you do other than bankruptcy?” ASUO President Bill Miner ex pressed similar thoughts. He said he has objections to some of Eyster’s suggestions, hut the rent increase is justified. “I know where he’s coming from,” Miner said, “and I really don’t envy his position. ” Miner and Eyster met Jan. 30 to discuss the changes. And Miner said his priority was Eyster’s pro posal to keep residents to their contracts. During the 1995-96 school year, residents could break their con tracts, paying a fee of $1 per day left on the contract. That fee in creased to $2 per day the next year. “We're one of the few landlords in town that does that," he said. Eyster said he now wants to hold all residents to their year long contracts. This means that to leave housing, residents must pay off the remainder of their con tracts, which is about $9 per day. “I can’t afford to have students come here for a month and then meet someone off campus and move out,” he said. "In the real world, you don’t get to walk away from a contract.” One group this will affect is the greek system. Of approximately 3,500 people who lived in housing over the 1996-97 school year, 1,049 moved out before the end of the year. Greek houses were desti nations for 218 of those residents. Panhellenic and Interfraternity Council officials said they will meet with Eyster soon. “We’re kind of taking it on for the whole student body,” Panhellenic Council President Marisa Ramsdell said. “You need to have the choice whether or not to move out.” She stressed this is a student body issue, not a greek issue. Interfraternity Council Presi dent Steve Sutton said Eyster’s change will hurt the greek system. “It’s definitely a threat to some of the fraternities,” he said. “I think the University system needs to keep in mind whether or not they want to support one of their largest student groups.” By holding residents to their con tracts, fewer students will be mov ing into greek houses, Sutton said. This will result in the loss of two fra ternity houses next year, and proba bly more after that, he said. “I think it’s mainly just the fact that we need to have people mov ing into the chapter houses just to maintain them,” Sutton said. Sutton said he hopes Eyster will not change the fee. Greenough said he sees Eyster’s proposal as beneficial to the resi dence halls. “This is a good thing for people living in the residence halls be cause the people who leave are leaving a burden on the remaining students,” he said. There is a relationship between residents moving out and exces sive conduct, Greenough said. To take further steps to save housing money, Eyster said he plans on changing meal plans for employees. No one change will make a big difference, Eyster said, but hous ing has a $20 million self-support ed budget and solid budget predic tions are hard to make. Each small change will make a difference. “These are changes that are de signed to gradually put us in a bet ter position,” he said. MARY LOU LORP * SOT NO SHADOW $9.99 5EE MARY LOU LORP * ue in AT 16.MET/CPW YOU HAVfMjiMtV UP AMP 6TT TO Tt)t rroKt 5 u&Smmb atm i ONtY 600» WOUdH RKIMTY 2X Mi EU6EW • WIST rm 4 SOKA • 6*3-6902 CORVAUlS • 9S5 NW KM6& •’B2-M32 PIZZA! One Large single topping only $9.95! FREE DELIVERY! Find out why our customers say it's "The best pizza in Lane County" Not valid with any other offer. 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