Make no mistake, I came to Guelph because of the University of Guelph. I liked the campus, I liked the area around the campus, and I liked the bus pass that came with my tuition and gave me access to the rest of the city. Guelph was 30 minutes away from the town I grew up in, but the two places were worlds apart.
That was 20 years ago, and Guelph is very different now. So is the University of Guelph. What was once a place that welcomed its new students warmly with supportive open arms has become host to the most fiendish game of musical chairs. They call it “strategic growth”, but what’s apparent is that this phrase is only half right.
For the last few weeks, local media outlets have been reporting on growing concerns from incoming students and their parents. They had heard nothing from the U of G about whether or not a spot in residence had been secured, or the likelihood that a spot will be secured in time for the Labour Day weekend. If a spot on campus isn’t possible, then they have to come up with Plan B, which is the point where the rest of Guelph starts clenching.
“Currently, more than 1,300 students are without a place to live on campus, and the ripple effects will be considerable and compounding for our community for years to come. It is completely unacceptable,” Mayor Cam Guthrie said in a statement last week. “Housing costs will most certainly rise, making it harder not just for students scrambling for accommodations, but for current residents and newcomers to Guelph and other individuals already struggling to find housing in our community.”
He's right, by the numbers, the University of Guelph says “just over” 7,000 students have accepted their admission to the U of G, but only 85 per cent will be accommodated in campus housing. That means over 1,000 more people are about to hit the Guelph housing market in the next few weeks, a thousand more applicants for the same small number of affordable (relatively speaking) rental units.
The University of Guelph has thrown a grenade into the housing crisis, and they want us to think it’s a clerical error. “We understand the uncertainty that comes with not receiving a residence confirmation,” said Melinda Scott, vice provost, student affairs in a far from reassuring statement. “U of G is committed to supporting students with information about off-campus housing and a suite of other services to help make their transition to university and their first year successful.”
Now, will you believe that the links provided in this statement on the U of G’s website does not actually direct you somewhere that can help you find a place to live?
Has the U of G co-ordinated with area landlords to see what can be made available to incoming students? Do they know what kind of availability there will be in September? Will there be any financial assistance for students forced to seek out accommodations on the hot open rental market, even if it’s just a free daily coffee and muffin from Creelman?
Let’s tell the same story through two different statements released three months apart.
On March 11, the U of G posted a media release that said they had completed a Housing Demand Study noting, “the University is able to maintain its current residence accommodations, which include consistently accommodating all first-year student requests and providing guaranteed spaces for incoming international and domestic out-of-province students.”
The story was different almost exactly 90 days later. “The University of Guelph does not guarantee housing,” that release said a week ago. “Knowing on-campus housing is an important factor for many when selecting a university, the university began communicating as early as April with applicants who did not have a confirmed spot in residence so they could consider all of their options and have more time to explore off-campus housing.”
Strange then that so many people seem to feel like they were left up the proverbial creek.
“As of June 10, U of G housing staff began connecting with students and their families about their spot on the residence waitlist, along with information about expanded supports for students who live off-campus,” the same release also said.
So were we letting people know in April, or were we letting people know last week? What were you letting people know, and if they were in the know, why were they reaching out to each other in private Facebook groups and then reaching out to local media?
We’re unlikely to get answers to these questions because the U of G, like so many of our public institutions now, observes a philosophy that communication is a one-way street (though my DMs are open, guys).
Having some vague idea of what they’re doing about the problem is one thing, but how did we get here, again? How does the University of Guelph go from “We’ve got this covered” to “Oh, no we don’t” in less than 100 days?
And this is not just a campus issue, but a community issue. In their Housing Demand Study release there’s talk about adding “nearly 2,500 student beds in the next few years”, but no mention of how all of those are private developments, and though some of them are on U of G land, they are not projects that the university is putting money into developing.
That’s what makes this doubly insulting because the U of G is one of Guelph’s biggest landowners, and they haven’t built any new residential spaces for decades, all while increasing enrolment at an exponential rate. They’re relying on the rest of Guelph to catch all the crumbs that they’re letting fall off the table, but they’re not crumbs so much as whole portions.
At the same time, the university pays a “heads in beds” levy to the City in lieu of property taxes, and that rate hasn’t changed since the mid-1980s. In other words, they’re not taking any action on a problem they’re helping to create while leaving the burden to the City of Guelph who only collects a small portion of income from an institution that more or less owns the northside of Stone Road West.
The University of Guelph created a problem it doesn't seem to have ability, or perhaps the willingness, to solve on its own. That’s not an accident, that’s negligence, and that’s to say nothing of the fact this is a problem that keeps happening. Who will stop it from happening again?
