Thorp nixes gender-neutral housing

Chancellor Holden Thorp rejected an initiative on Monday that would have allowed students of the opposite gender the option to live together in UNC’s residence halls, starting next semester.

Thorp said his decision on the proposal, which gained support from hundreds of students and a wide variety of campus groups in the fall, does not mean that he is opposed to it.

In a memo Monday to Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Winston Crisp, Thorp said the reason for the rejection was that UNC’s “stakeholders off campus” had not been adequately educated about the proposal.

“This is an important thing, and it deserves my effort for people outside the University to understand that it’s about student safety,” Thorp said in an interview.

Terri Phoenix, director of UNC’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Center, said those supporting the plan were “tremendously disappointed.”

“The people who currently feel unsafe will be disappointed as well,” Phoenix said.

Thorp acknowledged that the Board of Trustees was among the “outside stakeholders” he referred to in his memo.

Board chairman Wade Hargrove did not respond to calls for comment.
Thorp took weeks to deliberate on the proposal.

“Obviously, he’s been wrestling with it for some time, so I thought it could go either way,” Crisp said.

“I respect the fact that he has to weigh a lot of things,” he said.
The plan’s advocates have stressed that a gender-neutral option would make LGBTQ students feel safer in residence halls.

Sophomore Kevin Claybren, who has led the initiative, said that although he is disappointed, he doesn’t think gender-neutral housing has been permanently tabled.

“This just means that Terri Phoenix and I will work even more diligently,” he said. “I don’t want people to think that this is the end-all be-all decision — it’s not.”

Claybren said the coalition is now planning to have the initiative approved for the 2013-2014 year.

In his memo, Thorp cited the fact that no other UNC-system school has adopted a gender-neutral housing option yet.

But Jagir Patel, director of publicity for the Campus Y, which expressed support for the plan, said this isn’t sound reasoning.
“Since no other UNC school has implemented one, I don’t think that should be a reason for us to not take the steps to do so,” Patel said. “We should be leading our peers in the UNC system.”

Thorp said he hopes supporters see that his decision reflects his desire to see it succeed.

“I think they’ll see with the serious way we’re taking this that this is something important to us,” Thorp said.

Crisp said the end goal is still implementation.

“We’re going to try to educate folks to a point where (Thorp) feels like he can move forward.”

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