UC's Housing Crisis

The University of Cincinnati is in the midst of a housing crisis. Year after year the university is admitting more and more students into an increasingly limited number of dorms. This past fall, we saw first hand the effects of this housing crisis on both university students and the surrounding community. A significant number of students were forced to live in hotels and other temporary accommodations as the university worked to expand the number of available beds on campus. Those incapable of living in these temporary accommodations or paying for more expensive off campus accommodations were forced to drop out or transfer.

We’ve already seen it again through this year's housing application. The housing application opened on February 6th at 12:00pm. Only two hours later at 2:00pm, students were being told that they’ve been wait-listed, stuck not knowing if the university will have housing for them in the fall.

On its face, this is just a continuation of a trend of rising enrollment levels at the university. Since 2013, every single year has been a year of record admissions, leading to a peak student population of 48,000 just this past fall; however, since the start of President Pinto’s term these trends have rapidly accelerated. This is not reflective of a natural increase due to the rising notoriety of the university, but instead an explicit choice made by the university administration to artificially balloon the size of our student population. This can be seen most clearly in our admittance rate, which has risen from a roughly steady 75% from 2014-2018 to 85% as of 2021. Pinto began his term as University President in February 2017.

And where are all of these new students coming from? Not the surrounding Cincinnati community. The percentage of instate students at the university has dropped almost 10% since last year, going from 79% in-state students to 70% in-state students. Additionally, the university is not representative of its surrounding communities. The city of Cincinnati is approximately 42% black and the surrounding tri-state area is approximately 11% black. How does the university compare? Only 8.7% of the 2022 student body identified as African-American, a statistic which had not changed significantly since the original demands of the Irate8 in 2015.

This massive increase in students does not only put strain on our housing resources, but every other student resource at the university. It would put an immense amount of strain on academics and student services. Many student services – such as CAPS, the learning center, one stop, the academic writing center, accessibility resources, and our dining halls – are already operating at capacity. Now imagine them operating with four thousand, five-thousand, or even ten-thousand more students at this university. The majority of whom would be freshman and sophomores, who use these resources more than upperclassmen.

Such a massive increase in the student population would not just affect the university population, but also the surrounding Cincinnati community. As the university continues to expand, more and more of the neighboring houses and land must be usurped for the university’s goals. In doing so, the university and its partners continue to contribute to the ongoing gentrification projects supported by the City of Cincinnati and 3CDC.

At the August 2022 meeting of the University of Cincinnati Board of Trustees – not even a month after hundreds of university students are forced to move into off campus hotels because of the administration’s poor planning and lack of adequate housing – University President Nevil Pinto says:

I'm very excited about the plans we have for next year. I think if I were to summarize it, I would say you haven’t seen anything yet. Wait until you see the results of next year. We're on a tremendous trajectory with tremendous momentum and I think great things are still to happen here at the university.

These “great things” that he spoke about are clear to us now. Overpopulation, gentrification, exploitation. We will not remain silent in light of these plans, and demand that the university take immediate action to prevent the continual degradation of the university community.

We the undersigned therefore demand:

Adequate dorm services for students already in university housing.

Students deserve hygienic, safe, and accessible places to live. We the undersigned therefore demand that the university provide students with conditions conducive to learning including but not limited to:

1. The expansion of accessible housing

2. A lack of hazardous conditions like mold or animal infestation

3. Free laundry for students

4. Functional elevators

5. Adequate temperature control

Increased transparency around housing and admittance

Students deserve safe and stable housing that is not dependent on an incoming class size to which they had no prior knowledge. We the undersigned therefore demand that the university provide students with the information necessary to make appropriate housing decisions before the housing portal opens, including but not limited to:

1. Projected housing need as compared to available university beds

2. Admittance rates and incoming class size goals

3. Changes in pricing or the amount of available beds at the current price rate

Compensation for students wait-listed and forced into off campus housing

Students deserve secure housing at or near the expected cost of living in dorm housing. In an effort to combat the uncertainty that the current housing crisis has caused, we the undersigned therefore demand that the university provide compensation to those without housing in the amount greater than or equal to 7,000 dollars a year

Decreasing the housing cost

Students deserve housing that is affordable and allows them to flourish in their studies at the university. We the undersigned therefore demand that the university provide affordable housing for students at a reduced rate, decrease the cost of all housing, and freeze costs for 5 years to the following rates:

1. $6000/year for apartments style dorms

2. $5000/year for suite & junior suite style dorms

3. $4000/year for traditional style dorms

Decrease the amount of students admitted per year

Students deserve to live and learn in an environment that is focused on their achievements and is not plagued by overcrowding. We the undersigned therefore demand that the university engage in work that decreases the student population size and focuses on recruitment from local communities of color.