News
Greek leaders said yesterday they expect administrators to accept a Greek Leaders Council proposal to be submitted this week requesting that the recently mandated Safety and Security walk-throughs occur only twice a week and on a scheduled basis within a six-hour time window.
Members of coed, fraternity, sorority houses and undergraduate societies were also informed yesterday that the resumption of walk-throughs, currently scheduled for next Tuesday, will be delayed until a plan for their implementation is complete.
After meeting with Assistant Deans of Residential Life Cassie Barnhardt and Deb Carney yesterday, Interfraternity Council President Duncan McLean '03 told The Dartmouth that he would be "surprised" if the Office of Residential Life fails to approve the new proposal.
According to both McLean and Sigma Phi Epsilon summer President Patrick Granfield '03, Greek leaders are now hopeful that the dialogue between the GLC and ORL concerning the College's new policy allowing unannounced security checks of all Coed Fraternity Sorority and undergraduate society houses has presented a compromise agreeable to both parties.
"The consensus among Greek leaders is that this is the compromise we've been working for," McLean said.
"This seems to be the win-win situation both parties were looking for," Granfield noted.
The new proposal marks only a slight change from the GLC's second proposal, submitted earlier this week, which requested that walkthroughs occur only once a week and on a scheduled basis.
However, it represents a significant departure from their first proposal, which suggested that houses themselves take on responsibility for safety measures, in theory eliminating the need for Safety and Securitys walk-throughs.
Whether or not Greek houses will still carry out extra safety training measures will now probably be left up to individual houses, McLean said.
Although most Greek leaders, according to McLean, are content with the proposed compromise, there is "not 100 percent resounding compliance on it," and there remains "still some lingering anger about how it [the new policy] was dropped on us."
"There are a few house presidents who think it is a bit more than they're willing to sign on to," and some plan to meet with their membership before signing the proposal, McLean explained.
Furthermore, whatever compromise policy is reached over the summer, the policy issue will still be revisited in the fall, when ORL may attempt to re-institute random, unannounced walk-throughs at that time.
In addition, the GLC's latest proposal still will not tackle the second part of ORL's new policy -- the restriction on outdoor alcohol consumption -- although McLean said the GLC hopes to draw up a separate proposal on this issue within the next two weeks.
"[Prohibition of outdoor alcohol consumption] is a difficult battle to fight," but the GLC does intend to fight it, McLean added.
Neither Carney nor Barnhardt returned calls seeking comment yesterday.
