Director of Residence Life Sarah Waters addressed the Undergraduate Student Government on Monday to discuss the future of on-campus housing at the University. New potential legislation was also introduced.

This year, approximately 6,220 students live in residence halls on-campus, accounting for more than 90 percent of first year students. Currently, maximum capacity for on-campus housing is about 6,500 students.

This maximum capacity recently rose with the opening of the Greek Housing units, but will fall again next school year with the closing of Harshman Hall, scheduled for this coming May, Waters said.

Once Harshman Hall is closed, maximum University capacity will decrease to 5,900 – less than the current and projected demand for on-campus housing, which may rise as high as 6,400.

One solution may be for the University, through Residence Life, to lease off-campus apartments and offer them as options through residence life.

“We probably won’t get all three to four hundred beds… but we feel pretty strongly that we will likely be able to recoup maybe about 200 beds and have off-campus apartments as part of our housing,” Waters said.

This leasing process has not been finalized – residence life will be meeting with a company in town to finalize whether they will be accepting the company’s proposal for leasing apartments.

Regardless of any potential off-campus apartments the University may lease, there will no longer be enough beds to house all students who want to live in University housing.

“For a very very long time at BGSU if you wanted housing you could get housing, and it didn’t matter about your class standing,” Waters said.

About 600 students who have met the two-year residency requirement live on campus.

The Office of Residence Life will focus on communicating with students regarding off-campus housing and the need to look for leases to live off-campus in non-University housing.

Residence Life will likely be raising its costs by about 2 percent for next year, but this is not in response to the lower supply of its housing, Waters said. She did, however, acknowledge that property owners in Bowling Green may adjust their renting prices as demand grows.

The question of air conditioning remodeling for residence halls was raised, but this renovation is generally too costly, Waters said.

The Office of Residence Life employs over 400 undergraduate employees, 14 graduate employees and over 30 professional staff.

“The only money that residence life gets we need to bring in, so the majority of our revenue comes from room income,” Waters said.

The office’s budget includes over $8 million annually towards debt services, $3.6 million in personnel, $3 million in utilities and $3.6 million for campus operations. The office annually budgets for over $2 million in surplus to go towards future capital planning projects.

Bryce Davis, diversity affairs senator, introduced a new resolution on Monday night. The resolution would create an official USG diversity statement.

“This is something that USG lacks, and I think it’s something vital and important to our being here on–campus,” Davis said. “It’s very important that we… empower student voices and uplift those who are usually looked down upon or devalued for whatever reason that may be.”

The resolution was tabled until next week’s meeting.

President Amanda Dortch informed the USG body about the possibility of holding an election night watch party similar to its debate watch parties.

Dortch also discussed the renewable energy feasibility study recently conducted by the Office of Sustainability. The results of the study will be posted on Oct. 25. It will focus on energy usage around campus.

Vice President Richard Racette congratulated the general assembly on a successful town hall meeting that was held at 6 p.m. on Monday. The topics included parking and campus safety.

“We had about 50 people that showed up, which is a really good turnout,” Racette said. “I was really impressed by the amount of student involvement that we had.”

Future town hall meetings are expected to occur. There will likely be another one this semester and three next semester.

The Aruna 5k run will be held on Nov. 5 and costs $20 per runner. The event sponsors employment for former victims of sex trafficking. Donations are also accepted. Runners and donners can learn more at arunaproject.org.

USG is now more active on its Twitter and Instagram, and students are encouraged to follow USG’s handle: @bgsu_USG.