Housing provisions offer renters the means of filing formal complaints
Students who are dissatisfied with housing, management or roommates are not entirely left to their own. Both on- and off-campus housing facilities have provisions for students to issue a formal complaint.
If living on campus, a student wishing to make a formal complaint must work through the following channels. The student would begin first with his/her resident assistant, said Anne Spackman, staff assistant for housing services.
If the student is not happy with the decision of an RA or does not feel comfortable going to an RA because of the nature of the complaint, the student can then appeal to the area coordinator or resident director.
If not satisfied with that, Spackman said students can then go to one of the two assistant directors. One of the assistant directors handles physical property matters whereas the other one deals with things that pertain to resident life.
“Almost every problem that comes up gets handled either by the RA or the area coordinator,” Spackman said.
Spackman was aware of very few cases that went further up in the chain.
“The issue can almost always be resolved,” she said.
Spackman said all of this information is available to students in their resident handbooks.
Off-campus students may find it to be a little more difficult to issue a formal complaint, especially if the student’s complaint concerns the manager.
A student wishing to issue a formal complaint about maintenance, roommates or anything of that nature should go to the manager of the apartment complex.
“We empower the resident managers to not only have the authority to make decisions, but to handle complaints,” said Shawn Sorensen, managing owner of Continental Apartments.
Sorensen said it is very infrequent when a complaint will come to him because they are almost invariably handled by the manager of the complex.
Dana Tatanish, office assistant at Old Farm Apartments, said the majority of complaints Old Farm gets are concerning repairs.
“I wouldn’t really say they are complaints, just apartments needing repairs,” she said.
Tatanish said Old Farm occasionally receives complaints against roommates, but most are repairs.
If a student would like to issue a formal complaint against management, he or she should first ask the manager for the owner’s telephone number.
If students cannot obtain a manager’s telephone number, students have the option of consulting with an attorney on campus, who offers free legal advice to full-time students, said Tiffany Evans, director of student activities.
“The attorney will provide students with advice on how to proceed to issue a complaint or how to resolve a matter, but will not offer representation. He will just offer advice,” Evans said.
Evans said everything is kept completely confidential and even the nature of what is discussed is kept confidential between the attorney and the student.
The attorneys hold individual counseling sessions by appointment on Monday and Thursday evenings. Students wishing to utilize this avenue of approach should set up an appointment with Karen Rawlins at 797-3454.