Arbor Update

Ann Arbor Area Community News

Family Housing Residents Organizing

21. July 2004 • Rob Goodspeed
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I recieved this email from a resident of family housing who is helping create an organization called the “Family Housing Residents Organization”:

From: bpetrede (at) umich.edu
Date: Wed, 21 Jul 2004 01:25:24 -0400
Subject: saving family housing

Hello,

Family housing is being taken away from families due to the administration’s inaction in finding housing for single undergraduates due to the increasing size in incoming freshmen classes. This has been a documented problem since 1998 and nothing has been done. The administration has decided that they will use a portion of family housing to house single undergraduate students they no longer have room for. They did not tell family housing residents until after leases were signed. They have offered some compensation $500 or moving costs (undergraduates are being offered $500 plus $500 in Entree Plus), extended lease termination, and the offer of letting some families transfer to different sections while keeping thier current rates the same until next year. This was all done quickly and without transparency. This does not make up for the loss that families are facing in regards to community, security, and what they believed to be the terms of thier lease. Some families were not offered the
transfer option, some were, but could not be accomodated, others who applied for family housing were denied in order to make space for single undergrads (unbeknownst to them).

Family housing residents are upset and we are taking action. Housing will not give us any definitive answers or help us. We are setting up a group called Family Housing Residents Organization have a negotiations team and we are creating a platform. Many people at the University are not aware of these changes. I don’t imagine that the undergraduates are completly happy with this situation either. Family housing is a close knit, diverse, community, home to people of many ethnic backgrounds, family situations, graduate married students with or without children, a few single grad students, domestic partners and undergraduate students who are married and/or have children. Family housing must be saved for families, we are trying to make people aware of the situation and the impact of it on residents of family housing.

Thank You, Barbara

P.S.
If you would like to be added to our e-mail list to keep current on the situation, please e-mail me back with the e-mail address you prefer to be contacted at.

  1. I don’t know why it’s being alleged that Housing has known about this for ages. Leases are signed prior to May 1, correct? Contrary to what is claimed here, Housing would not have known about the big freshman class until well after May 1, when new freshman have to announce their intentions.

    And it’s not true that this has been a problem since 1998. There have been some squeeze years, for sure, but the size of the freshman class goes up and down. This year is unprecedented, not predicted, and certainly not planned.

    I don’t work in Housing, but I do some low-level support work related to enrollment, and I know what was planned.
       —Cranky    Jul. 24 '04 - 03:03PM    #