Affordability and modernity do not often go hand in hand, but the University is attempting to blend the two in its new housing plan.

The Living Learning Center, an addition that revolutionized University Housing and emphasized integration of academia and students’ social lives, set a precedent for future housing endeavors. The Housing Strategic Plan will, upon completion, offer students a similar living environment, and it will focus specifically on retaining students who would typically move out of the residence halls after their freshman or sophomore year.
Provost Linda Brady, who is in charge of the plan, said strengthening the “critical mass” of residential students will enhance intellectual and social life on campus.
“We think it is important to be a residential university,” Brady said. “That really contributes to the educational experience that students have.”
But the ability to implement the Housing Strategic Plan came at a price. When the Oregon State Board of Higher Education granted the University permission to sell Westmoreland Apartments in July 2006, it stated the University must create a long-term housing plan to accommodate the needs of all students. Westmoreland was a 404-unit complex intended to house students with families. International, graduate and low-income students also occupied the apartments.

The Westmoreland sale did not go unnoticed. The ASUO and the Residence Hall Association both opposed the sale, and encouraged OUS to remove the sale from its agenda.
These organizations and other student advocates, including local politicians, saw conflict within the sale because Westmoreland was an affordable place for “non-traditional students” to live. At Westmoreland, rent was approximately $200 cheaper than at the average apartment complex.
Brady said new unit affordability is one of the housing plan leadership’s main concerns. The price estimates of the new units are on the high end, she said, because students who said they would rent a unit at a higher price would be less likely to change their minds if the unit actually cost less than the original prediction.
“We need to go back and we need to look at the feasibility of the prices that we attached to certain units in the plan,” Brady said. “We don’t want to put ourselves in a position where we’re building housing and students can’t afford it. Because we want to bring more students to campus.”
Director of Housing Mike Eyster said because University Housing is self-sufficient, the administration cannot lower the price of rooms because rates are based on the cost of operation.
“(Brady is) hoping to address the needs of students’ financial needs through a financial aid approach as opposed to lowering the cost of particular services,” said Eyster. “The only thing we can do in Housing is make sure that we operate as reasonably and economically as we can, but our costs are required to be covered by our rates.”
Then-ASUO President and Vice President Adam Walsh and Kyla Coy in a letter to four top University administrators called the sale a “diversity issue” in 2005. Because administrators made the decision without student or resident consultation, Walsh and Coy wrote, “we find the manner in which the University has approached this issue to be utterly disrespectful not only to the students who live in Westmoreland, but to the established approach to dialogue and shared governance between students and administration that we not only appreciate, but that we have come to expect.”
The University administration had concluded that deferred maintenance and renovation costs of the 45-year-old complex were not worth the significant expenses. Therefore, it elected to sell the apartments, which included a childcare center, and use the profits to “make key housing and property acquisition investments that will benefit the greatest number of students.”
But the Housing Strategic Plan benefits students in different ways than Westmoreland did. Whereas Westmoreland provided cheap living, the new housing will provide rooms and suites up to the standard set by modern residential universities. It will encourage student learning in a social environment, and should appeal to the more than 3,000 students who responded to the online housing survey, distributed last academic year. Many participants said they would prefer dolled-up semi-suites and suites, which could be priced as high as $15,780 per academic year, or about $5,300 per term including the standard meal plan.
The housing plan calls for renovation of one-third of existing beds and construction of 1,900 new beds. It certainly offers appealing options, including the renovated traditional doubles and singles. The smallest newly constructed room is the “Modern Traditional Double” – like the rooms in the LLC.
The Modern Traditional Double would cost about $12,020 per academic year. That’s more than $4,000 more than the current regular double room.
While mapping out the housing plan, its leadership examined housing at peer institutions, including the University of Michigan; University of California, Santa Barbara and the University of Puget Sound. All of these institutions, boast higher student-resident rates. It is the primary goal of the Housing Strategic Plan to get more students living on campus, “to support and enhance our character as a residential University,” according to the plan. The theory behind this goal is that living on campus contributes to a richer academic experience, and ultimately more successful students.
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