When residents of College-in-the-Woods’ Mohawk and Cayuga halls moved into their dorms in August, many were surprised to find their common rooms unusually devoid of furniture. They have become increasingly angry as, three weeks into the semester, some of the furniture was only recently returned.
The furniture was removed from the buildings over the summer in order to undergo cleaning and repairs. While missing couches and chairs have recently been returned to Cayuga, residents in Mohawk were living with only minimal common room furniture until yesterday, when a number of chairs and an ottoman were returned.
“I think this is ridiculous,” said Andrew Wagner, a freshman Mohawk resident. “We pay our money to live in these suites and we don’t even have our furniture.”
According to the Office of Residential Life’s assistant director for CIW, David Garsow, the furniture was removed from the buildings and taken to Physical Facilities in order to be cleaned, repaired and re-upholstered. As repairs were not completed over the summer, the furniture was still missing three weeks into the semester.
“The furniture was scheduled for repair, but unfortunately was not able to be completely repaired by the start of the school year,” Garsow said. “Our assistant director of Residential Life for facilities [Rene Coderre] is working with Physical Facilities to ensure the furniture is repaired and returned as quickly as possible.”
Physical Facilities, though, says it was only recently notified of the need to clean and return the furniture.
“With Mohawk we were notified of a need to repair or clean the furniture only a couple of weeks ago,” said Karen Fennie, a Physical Facilities spokeswoman. “We are in the process of doing so right now.”
Both Residential Life and Physical Facilities do agree that the furniture will be returned piece by piece as repairs are completed over the coming weeks.
“Our department expects the furniture to be repaired on an ongoing basis throughout the semester,” Garsow said. “We are optimistic that the vast majority of the missing pieces will be returned by the time spring semester begins.”
Students have reacted angrily to news that the missing furniture will not be immediately returned, and have begun taking furniture from study lounges — resulting in suites being searched by resident assistants for the missing furniture.
Some are annoyed that they have been forced to purchase replacements for the missing furniture.
“I couldn’t even invite people in our suite,” Wagner said. “I had to go to Wal-Mart and spend $40 on chairs that suck.”
Many Mohawk residents continue to remain dissatisfied with how the issue has been handled by the administration. Only Monday were chairs starting to be returned to the suites.
“They are not handling it with any sense of urgency,” said Chris Iannone, a sophomore mechanical engineering major and a Mohawk resident. “Most of the time we’re sitting on the ground … we’ve been here two weeks.”