It seems that Boston College has finally caved to pressure coming from the community to do something about the deteriorating situation in Allston and Brighton. Longtime residents and newcomers alike have grown fed up with incessant noise, trash, vomit and property destruction brought about by BC students. As a result, the college has run into stiff opposition to its plans to embark on several major construction projects as part of a campus expansion plan.
The Allston-Brighton TAB reports:
Under BC’s plan, the school would hire five Boston Police officers to patrol problem areas such as Cleveland Circle, Chestnut Hill Avenue and Lake Street on Thursday through Saturday nights side by side with Boston College Police. The school would pay for the overtime details with its own funds. “To my knowledge, this has never been done before,†Keady said in reference to the team policing....
...“Capt. [Genevieve] King has made it clear that if we show up and a party is raging, arrest is the preferred response,†he said, drawing applause from the crowd.
One can only hope the college and police department can handle the inevitable flood of complaints from indignant parents upset that their precious child has been held accountable for their behavior.
One can also hope that Boston University decides to follow BC's example.
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Comments
BC Rowdies
By Anonymous
Sun, 08/26/2007 - 6:19am
Good - I have lived in the area, and I went to one of the graduate schools there. I have never seen such rampant alcoholism, binge drinking and irresonsible public behavior. Its a mixture of serious alcoholism combined with selfish, spoiled brat mentality and I'm glad something is finally being done.
Can't blame people in the neighborhood for putting up resistance
By independentminded
Sun, 08/26/2007 - 1:19pm
because when a college or university expands its campus into a neighborhood or neighborhoods like that, it really does destroy a neighborhood.
This is probably the worst
By Chris
Sun, 08/26/2007 - 10:15pm
This is probably the worst idea possible. First off please don't over generalize a school of 10,000 students based on a select few.
Check out this blog for more reasons why this won't work.
web.mac.com/benostrander/iWeb/BenOstrander.com/...A9B37C1ECD42.html
Doesn't Boston have enough crime to worry about without harassing college students? Loud parties are certainly an annoyance, and they can get out of hand, but there has got to be a way to handle this that won't waste tax dollars and tuition money. I would especially hate to see tuition raised or financial aid diverted just to appease the residents of Brighton. How about we shut down the houses that these absentee landlords keep renting out? How about we let BC build some more housing? Just things to think about...
The situation in Allston and
By Arborway
Sun, 08/26/2007 - 11:09pm
The situation in Allston and Brighton has been deteriorating for some time now. Years of "Please turn it down, OK?" have done nothing to improve the situation. Quite the opposite, actually.
College is about preparing young people for life in the real world. There is far more to that than coursework. If students cannot behave in a manner acceptable to society, they need to face consequences as they have failed to live up to their responsibilities.
At your blog, you worry about the national image of the school if the number of students getting arrested increases, and you worry about how it will impact the poor students. This is not about how the school looks on a stats page, or how it might inconvenience someone who willfully chooses to make their neighbor's lives less livable. This is about people who wish to be considered adults taking responsibility for their actions and being forced to accept said responsibility whether they want to or not.
People want to sleep at night, they want to be secure in their property and their possessions and they have the right to do so.
The only problem I see here is that some BC students just don't want to stop being children.
Too bad for them.
Just a quick post...
By bostran1
Mon, 08/27/2007 - 8:48am
I was the author of the blog post Chris linked to above, not Chris. I would like to clarify since I suppose its not clear from the entry that I don't give a hoot about college and graduate school rankings. I think they are pointless at actually measuring an institution's ability to teach and train individuals. My point was that it is odd that Boston College (an institutions notorious for carrying about its rankings) would actively arrest students and jeopardize the ranking it puts so much stock in.
Secondly, I completely agree that area residents (including me, I live near Cleveland Circle) should not have to put up rowdy college students at all hours of the night. Furthermore, the residents should not be the ones that have to call those students or knock on doors to attempt to get them to quiet down. It greatly deteriorates the quality of life in the neighborhood. However, I highly doubt that this arrest-on-sight policy is going to actually occur or make a significant impact. Like I mentioned in the blog post Chris linked to, the logistics of it are far too troublesome for it to occur once or even multiple times a weekend. I would hope BC would pay the police officers to police off-campus area and respond to rowdy parties and break them up rather than arrest students. With 5 police officers and an increased presence of BCPD, I believe that not only could the parties be broken up but an officer or two could stay around the problem area and make sure they don't start up again.
While the spirit of the new policy is a step in the right direction, the on-paper implementation is unweildly. Do not be surprised if students are not arrested, but certainly, I hope the problem of loud students decreases.
How about
By Anonymous
Mon, 08/27/2007 - 12:32am
How about we handle this the same way any one of the rest of us in Allston/Brighton would be dealt with if we held an obnoxious and loud party until all hours of the night and ignored repeated requests from the neighbors to keep it down?
Boston cops were being nice before and being ignored only to have to return to finally make arrests at the same places time after time. BC cops had little to no authority off campus and were just having to call Boston cops to get anything authoritatively done. This just closes the loop faster.
It's common courtesy to keep the noise down after around 11 PM but most of these college-aged adults are acting like middle-schoolers once they're out of their parents' houses and capable of obtaining cheap alcohol. If it takes a month of getting busted immediately to send a message through the college community, then so be it. Maybe the other 11 months of the year will be more peaceful in the wee hours of the night.
Students: pros and cons:
By independentminded
Tue, 10/02/2007 - 10:27am
On the one hand, having the students around makes things more exuberant and makes for safer streets at night, and they do contribute a great deal in positive ways. Not all students are drunk, rowdy and/or spoiled, but the ones who are most definitely make it much, much more difficult for the others.
The disadvantage is the fact that when students move into nearby neighborhoods, due to school expansions, the very character of a neighborhood gets destroyed, and loud parties/noise at all hours of the night becomes a problem.
Building more on-campus housing is probably the best idea.
Response
By DJ
Sat, 09/12/2009 - 12:09am
Thank you so much for the inteligent comment on the issue. I myself am a current BC student and and surprised by the intense response by authorities. (I am also surprised by the fact I just spent nearly all my money on books even after the tuition was paid for.) A responsible response is necessary for this being a serious problem but it must also be reasonable. Students party in college, thats just life, but to have these students arrested as a first response just seems assanying. It permiently goes on their records and potentially ruins the future attending BC built for them. If my tuition was raised in order to pay for the arrest of my friends, I simply couldn't afford to go to BC anymore and frankly, wouldn'y want to anymore.
Amen - Arrest Them All
By Andrew
Mon, 09/03/2007 - 7:49pm
I have a love/hate relationship with Allston/Brighton. I LOVE this area of the city during most months, particularly the summers, but come September, it turns into an extension of Boston College's worst dorms.
I was awakened last night at 3:30AM to a group of BC students on the streets here in Brighton, just indiscriminately yelling and breaking bottles and being idiots. I have never called the cops on anyone for noise, ever, anywhere, but my tolerance is lowering and this fall is only one weekend old..and I am as close as I have ever been to dropping a dime on these idiots. And I am not talking Friday at 11pm and some people outside, I am talking weeknight, 2-4 AM just random rowdiness in residential areas.
Enough with these arrogant, spoiled, jackass BC students, coming up from Connecticut and New Jersey, getting apartments with 27 friends on Mommy and Daddy's dime, and acting like they own the city.
I hope the BC and Boston police stick to their words, as cuffing and stuffing a few dozen BC students right out of the gate would set a GREAT precedent. Enough is enough.
Typical arrogant masshole attitude
By Anonymous
Tue, 10/02/2007 - 12:31am
Good to see how welcome college students are in Brighton-Allston with people like yourself "arborway". The situation isn't deteriorating so try a less obvious lie. Frankly, as a BC student I'm surprised that given this openly hostile attitude that we should be expected to even try to be respectful. Brighton has had BC students living off-campus in their neighborhoods for at least the past decade and most likely longer.The issues that face Brighton residents living near BC have been there for some time and to not have figured out that living where they do presents a certain number of events along side of it is ignorance. BC students aren't going to be leaving the Brighton area for a long time and the resistance against having more students on campus as opposed to living next door proves once and for all that you truly have no idea what you are talking about. In addition, if you try your condescending attitude about how we are a bunch of spoiled brats to my face, I promise you that you end up with a black eye. You are a disrespectful, cowardly individual who deserves any and all misfortune that comes your way.
Gee
By Gareth
Tue, 10/02/2007 - 10:55am
Nice to hear you aren't a spoiled brat. Or a disrespectful, cowardly individual.
Oh, Please
By Suldog
Tue, 10/02/2007 - 1:12pm
"...if you try your condescending attitude about how we are a bunch of spoiled brats to my face, I promise you that you end up with a black eye. You are a disrespectful, cowardly individual who deserves any and all misfortune that comes your way."
(italics mine)
This is truly funny stuff, coming from someone posting as "Anonymous".
Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com
Bet you won't say that to his face
By Gareth
Tue, 10/02/2007 - 1:23pm
Because you have to find his face first.
Aha!
if you try your
By SwirlyGrrl
Tue, 10/02/2007 - 2:59pm
if you try your condescending attitude about how we are a bunch of spoiled brats to my face, I promise you that you end up with a black eye.
The objective of said punching would be to fully validate their presumptions of your infantile predilections and failing self-control in the manner of a spoiled child, no doubt.