If you have a loud party but police never show up, you might assume that there will be no repercussions. But a University of Oregon program, the Good Neighbor Project, sends a letter to your landlord informing them of every noise or property complaint — even if police don’t respond and you never get a citation.
Multiple letters could result in eviction. The Unruly Gatherings Ordinance, which holds both renters and property owners responsible for noise and alcohol violations, has made absentee landlords more worried about neighborhood problems they might have ignored in the past.
“One of the frustrations that we heard from neighbors was that they stopped calling because we weren’t responding and they know we hadn’t come once,” said Kelly Putnam, manager of EPD’s West University Station. UO stepped in to collect records of the calls and forward them to property owners.
The Good Neighbor Project is neither a law nor initiative, rather it is run from the office of the Dean of Students without the involvement of EPD. At a City Club meeting on April 18, community and UO leaders praised the program, saying that it helps address the noise and partying in near-campus neighborhoods.
“It’s to warn the students that because of the Unruly Gatherings Ordinance, things are getting to the point where the residents might be held responsible,” said Paul Shang, dean of students and assistant vice president. “But also because of Unruly Gatherings, the managers and the property owners are being put on notice that they might become responsible as well.”
Audience members at City Club expressed frustration at UO’s recent growth — since 2007, the student body has grown from 20,000 to 25,000 and is now capped until class sizes can be reduced. With 80 percent of those students living off campus, families and elderly people near UO feel powerless as their neighborhoods change before their eyes.
Camilla Bayliss, co-chair of the Fairmount Neighborhood Association, has lived in the same house since 1972.
“For the past six or seven years we’ve been bombarded with changes,” Bayliss said. “With an increasing number of students there’s been an increase in noise, vandalism, unruly parties and a number of other code violations. The biggest challenges are parking and increasing numbers of student renters.”
Shang said that the combination of the Good Neighbor Project and the Unruly Gatherings Ordinance has helped community relations and student safety. He talked about a late night walk that UO administrators and city council members take once each term near campus. He said it’s shocking what they see.
“A surprising number of people are walking up and down those sidewalks looking for parties, yelling and screaming and often times being very obscene, urinating in public,” Shang said. ”Many of them quite inebriated, and many of them very young.”
Putnam said that in order to stretch the resources of EPD, they had to use a system of “triage,” where police respond to the most important calls, and the rest of the complaints are forwarded to landlords.
“The university doesn’t have an interest in punishing people,” Shang said. “Have your parties, have a good time — but be respectful of the fact that you live near other people.”