Chapel Hill rents are changing. New complexes are driving rent up and sending non-student residents out.
Despite some positive rhetoric by the University trying to promote affordability, its recent decision to turn the underused dorms of Stacy and Everett into conference housing shows something different. Any change must be towards creating more affordable housing for non-students.
Whether it is upgrading the dorms as affordable housing for staff — as Chapel Hill Town Council candidate Nancy Oates has proposed — or making them more attractive to students, the University has a responsibility to tackle the housing problem in Chapel Hill through its development of dorms.
While the costs of this development could be larger, it is a price that the University should be responsible for paying. It is wrongheaded to cut costs on its housing and lay the burden on members of the community in the form of raised rent.
The myth that our school is a player without agency in development should end. Instead, the University should strive to have more students on campus, to make off-campus housing as unintrusive as possible and to create affordable housing. This action is part of that.
While the Town Council has attempted to link the building of new high-rent apartment complexes with required low- to moderate-income units, many developers are choosing to pay a fee.
Especially for staff members at UNC, it will only become more difficult to live in this community as this development continues.
We cannot continue saving our money by making community members spend more.
