Posted: 09/05/07

The Margin
How the wet housing crunch came to be

Tom Kingston l columnist
tkingston@smcvt.edu

Vermont communities like Essex and Colchester typically have a least one staff member who has a master’s degree in planning. Some people move to Vermont because it’s a great place to raise a family. Some people move to Vermont because they want to live near their grandchildren when they retire. There are lots of reasons why people move to Vermont. Planners must make reasonable predictions so decisions made by town governments regarding matters such as ambulance service and economic development will make sense to those who live in these communities today, as well as those who will be living there 10 or 20 years from now.

A college community is different. There is fluctuation in the number of people who come and go each year, but that amount is limited. The age group is always the same.

According to an e-mail from Mike Samara, vice president for student affairs, when the drinking age in Vermont became 21, “St. Michael’s landed on a policy where seniors living in apartment type housing (surrounded by fellow seniors - who are almost always 21), may consume alcohol in accordance with stated policy expectations.”

Previously, in addition to dry dorms and “apartment-style housing,” three more types of housing were available to students. The college rented a space from the private sector and used it as a dry dorm. When Cashman Hall became ready for occupancy in the fall 2002, private sector housing was no longer used.

There were approximately 18 small houses on College Parkway in between Camp Johnson and the Interstate. This was called peripheral housing. The houses were occupied by about 100 juniors. They were classified as “self-governing” and received minimal supervision. I do not know if they were counted as wet housing, however, the best parties took place in the peripheral houses. These buildings were not suitable for habitation. Most either have been torn down or given other purposes.

Even with peripheral housing, there weren’t enough beds for everyone. About 100 students volunteered to live off-campus. All seniors who wanted to and juniors with good housing lottery numbers were selected.

When Canterbury Hall and Pontigny Hall were ready for occupancy in the fall 2004, peripheral and off-campus housing ceased to exist. In other words, on a particular day, as a result of policy decisions, 200 units of wet housing were eliminated and replaced with dry dorms. Thus, the apartment-style housing became valuable real estate. The number of people who wanted wet housing, but were denied increased by about 200. (People who do not drink also prefer the apartment-style housing because it is nicer than dorm and suite housing.)

There are 440 beds in the “apartments.” This seems like a reasonable amount because there usually are about that many seniors. However, the complicated room selection lottery ends up putting juniors who are not yet 21 in the premium one-person-per-bedroom townhouse apartments, while seniors who are 22 begrudgingly end up in dry dorms such as Founders Hall.

At this moment there are 540 students on campus who are 21 or older. As current students have their 21st birthdays, that number will grow to 844 (43 percent of the campus population) by the last day of classes before finals week in May. This number includes all seniors, about two-thirds of the juniors and several dozen first-years and sophomores (not all students begin college at the same age).

When the Board of Trustees made these policy changes, I do not know what the members’ rational was or if they even knew how many campus residents are 21 or older during the school year.  The trustees of democratic town governments must make policies that satisfy the residents (voters).  The main concern for college trustees is to make decisions that assure the permanence of the institution.

Tom Kingston represented the City of Montpelier on the Central Vermont Regional Planning Commission and was a member of the CVRPC E-Board, 1991 – 1996.