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By Kanupriya Arora

Entering the critical phase to finish dormitory construction by next fall, Oberlin College is still at odds with the town over site plans and infrastructure, in a standoff that may cost the College nearly $300,000 in bond money and thousands more in lost housing revenue.

“There are many things that are confusing the issue,” College Vice President of Finance Andrew Evans said.

The design plans for construction at the Johnson estate and Union Street sites are yet to be finalized, as city council has turned down a number of proposals put forth by the College over the last two months, due to concerns about issues like parking space and building density.

“We were projecting that we would be doing the bidding for contractors at this point,” Evans said. “We are behind schedule.”

For the new dormitories to be ready by next fall, the College has to begin construction by the end of this month, Evans said. In case of a delay, the College stands to lose a significant amount of money in student revenue and bond interest charges.

The College has been in the process of negotiating problems with town residents and council members to arrive at an acceptable proposal. Although the council approved the Union Street plan last week after it was significantly revised, the plan has been rendered unfeasible for now due to fire hazard issues.

Students weigh in

At present approximately 600 Oberlin students live off-campus; the new housing will reduce this number by half.

Seniors will still be able to live off-campus, according to Dean of Students Peter Goldsmith. However, the town housing alternative will be limited for junior and lower classes, who will only get permission to move into a town property house if College housing is full.

Even now there are a significant number of seniors who live on-campus, Goldsmith pointed out.

But some students contend that it’s the principle that counts.

“It is still a matter of having the choice,” senior Charles Baker said.

For many students, living off-campus implies privacy and autonomy. The College has a limited number of highly coveted singles, and the desire to live with friends in a more informal and independent setting drives many upperclassmen into town housing.

“It gives us a better opportunity to live a private life,” junior Daniel Ortiz said.

“In the new construction we expect to be able to offer many of these things,” Goldsmith responded, “though cost savings might still be a reason [to prefer town housing].”

The cost difference is key to some students who choose to live off-campus: the rent for most off-campus houses for a year is thousands of dollars cheaper than the cost of living in a College dorm.

In turn, students provide a lucrative source of revenue for town landlords, since the combined rent from eight students is usually higher than that from a single family or two.

According to Goldsmith, however, living off-campus is not necessarily a financial advantage because most students receive some sort of financial aid and housing is usually included in the package.

One alternative that combines on-campus and town housing experiences is offered by the College-owned properties on Woodland, Elm and Professor Street. These houses, about 50 in all, use the College network cable access and Safety and Security services, but at the same time enjoy a level of independence not found in dormitories.

Every year the College expends substantial effort and money into renovating and maintaining these houses, Goldsmith said.

“We have no intention of growing the size of the College,” he added, referring to the proposed housing. “The new residences are almost entirely singles.”

“Most students say that they prefer not to live in big dorms, that they like to be on their own and they like houses,” President Nancy Dye commented. “[The new housing] was designed with a lot of student input and students will like the houses that are built.”

College finances housing

This fall the College sold $15 million in bonds to fund its new student dorm projects, which will be erected in two phases and house a total of three hundred students.

Although the College does not have a clear estimate of housing costs, the projected expense is currently $50,000 per bed.

While Associate Vice President of Finance Ron Watts warned that the costs could run over, Evans asserted that the College would stick to its budget, in any event.

Bond money can be used only for capital projects like the Science Center or student housing and cannot go into the general fund. The money is kept by a third-party “trustee,” who reimburses the College for construction expenses as they are incurred.

Although principal repayment will begin at the end of construction, interest on the bonds will be due beginning September next year.

The interest due in the first three years is provided for in the $15 million bond issue budget, so a delay in construction will not drain the College’s general fund, Watts said. However, bond interest will start accruing from the general fund at the end of this period.

“If the housing is not built we will have to pay interest on the loan without any new source of revenue,” Dye said.

The fiscal penalty for not completing housing by next year is roughly $300,000, Watts said.

By next year, the cost of construction materials may rise due to inflation, affecting housing costs. The budget will also be upset if the city council requires the College to pay for sewage and infrastructure upgrades to handle the load of new buildings.

Phase one of the College housing plans includes the Johnson estate and Union Street constructions, intended to accommodate 201 new students. Phase two, currently in its preliminary stages, will house the remaining 100-odd students.

The College needs to start building the dormitories within a month in order to be open by next fall, Watts said.

“If phase one is delayed one semester, it’ll have to be for the entire year,” Watts added, as the housing assignments are only made yearly.

The plans are also contingent upon favorable weather conditions. If Oberlin has a tremendous frozen spell starting in November and ending in March, construction will not be completed in time, Evans said.

City council elections have also slowed the process, according to Evans. “We should have had a proposal [finalized] before elections,” he said.

Housing projects are good investments because dorms have long and useful lives, Ron Watts said. However, buildings depreciate in value every year due to maintenance costs, and the College has to weigh in these costs when assessing the budget. These costs are projected to be recovered by increased revenue generated by students living in the dorms.

However, the city council’s ruling to cut the number of beds in the Union Street project by 24 will now affect the projected revenue of the project.

Evans explained that the revenue from those beds, originally intended to pay off depreciation costs, will now be lost and the College will have to make up the difference elsewhere.

“[The lost beds] are not going to break us, but it’s definitely an important issue,” Evans said.

“There are financial consequences for the College, but Oberlin College is prepared for the possibility that it won’t be ready till next fall,” Goldsmith said about the looming construction deadline.

“We don’t know when it’s going to happen, but it’s going to happen, probably,” Watts concluded.

Town/gown concerns

The main concerns raised by town residents about the plans have revolved around parking, the density of the proposed construction units and the planning process adopted by the College.

Many residents have expressed the opinion that the College failed to take the town’s interest into consideration before deciding to build housing and proceeding with plans.

“The College has in every aspect of this construction been extremely sensitive to the environment,” Dye said. “There is no validity to the claim that we are violating either the letter or the spirit of Charles Hall’s will.” Hall donated the Johnson house land to the College.

Since a public forum at the Johnson estate last month, the College has introduced a number of changes in its design plans to solicit town opinion and woo council approval. The parking spaces planned for the Union Street construction were reduced from 148 to 108, but after the council rejected these revised plans, the College devised new plans that called for only 37 new parking spaces.

In the new plan, the existing ice rink would serve as the main parking venue under this proposal.

Addressing concerns over the density of the proposed units, the council recommended the College foster dialogue with Union Street residents to arrive at a mutually acceptable plan.

In plans submitted to city council last week the number of housing units planned for Union Street was reduced from 13 to 11, to alleviate the density of the construction.

“Speaking for myself, I very much appreciate that the College has started talking to the neighbors,” Professor of Politics Ben Schiff, a resident near the Union Street site, said. “They have somewhat alleviated the density of the plan, and it was the most we could hope for, although it still changes the nature of the neighborhood.”

The housing plans for Union Street finally met with council approval last week, conditional upon the reduced number of housing units and parking lots. However, the approved plans are not viable for now as the Chief of the Oberlin Fire Department, Dennis Kirin, announced that the parking spaces in the ice rink would create a fire hazard.

“I am concerned about the parking lot situation, and still believe that the College should work in the broader context of the city,” Schiff said. “If there could be peripheral parking lots around the city for student parking, there would be much less pressure on existing parking lots.”

What’s next?

The College is currently in the process of salvaging design plans for the Johnson estate and Union Street sites in order to begin construction within the month. Although residents continue to have some misgivings about the dormitories and their possible impact on the town, the College administration is hopeful.

“All of the disputes over the construction are well on their way to being resolved, I think,” Dye said.

“There will be situations where the town and College will diverge on interests,” Evans said, but added that in general the relationship between the College and the town is good.

“It’s hard for Oberlin to accept this but there are significant differences between the interests of the College and the town and there always will be,” Dye commented. “As college relationships with towns go, we have a pretty good relationship. It’s inevitable that we will disagree but it will eventually be resolved.”

Additional reporting for this article by Douglass Dowty, Milena Evtimova and Josh Keating.