Petition Pushes for Accessibility in New Housing

A petition has circulated among students, parents and alumni urging the Board of Trustees to pause construction on the new residence halls west of Adirondack View. The petition, which had 458 signatories as of Nov. 1, asserts that the current designs of the residences are not universally accessible.

As approved by the Middlebury Select Board, the construction plans for the townhouses do not include elevators, so that only the first floor in each building will be wheelchair accessible. In a letter to the editor, Director of Residential Life Douglas Adams said that four of the sixteen townhouse units and three of the sixteen suites in the residence hall will be wheelchair accessible. In each accessible unit or suite, he said, at least one bedroom will be fully accessible. All other suites are designed to be “visitable,” as defined by the State of Vermont’s Act 88, a fire code for residential housing.

The petition states that providing only the minimum number of accessible spaces required by law is inadequate. “Middlebury’s new buildings should model innovative, inclusive designs that enable all our members to be in them,” it reads. “We can choose to demonstrate in word and in deed our values of diversity and inclusion.”
The petition originated when Barbara Ofosu-Somuah ’13, who now works in Washington, D.C., became concerned with the project.

“When I was at Middlebury, I worked at the Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity in Carr Hall for four years.” Ofusu-Somuah said. “I was active in finding ways to create spaces of inclusion for all students. Reading this was disappointing: Middlebury, you say so much and you want to be inclusive, but that’s not what this is.”

Ofosu-Somuah, with the help of Lauren Kelly ’13 and Dan Egol ’13, wrote a formal petition. They used Google Drive so that people could suggest changes to the wording.

“We didn’t want it to be an indictment or aggressive campaign, but rather a way to spark a conversation,” Ofosu-Somuah said.

She was struck by how quickly the petition spread: it garnered 100 signatures on the first day. “It was just amazing,” she said. “People began reaching out, asking how to become more involved. It was never my intention to be the figurehead on this, just the person who began the conversation,” she said. “It was a question of how do I, as a person who loves her alma mater, help it to be the best version of itself?”

Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of the College Katy Smith Abbott and Professor of Spanish & Chief Diversity Officer Miguel Fernández said that members of the core leadership team have discussed the issues raised in the petition, most recently at a meeting on Friday, Oct. 13.

“A number of students, faculty, staff and alumni have raised important questions about what accessibility policies we should have in place for new construction or major renovations of existing buildings,” said Bill Burger, Vice President for Communications and Marketing.

“They have challenged us to raise the bar and to operate to a higher standard of accessibility,” he said. “We welcome that discussion. It’s an important one for our community and it’s overdue. We long have operated under a policy of being in compliance with national and state standards.”

“What we’ve learned in the last several weeks is that our community wants more than compliance,” he said. “As Patton said, ‘diversity is an everyday ethic to be cultivated.’ That principle applies in this case as it does in so many areas of our shared experience at Middlebury.”

Burger noted that the College held two open meetings and heard no objections to the designs as presented. In a 2014 email, Adams invited all students to a presentation the developer to discuss the preliminary design and layout of the new residences. The event took place on Tuesday, Feb. 10, and representatives from Residential Life and Facilities Services were present.

Students were also invited to an informal conversation with the design group and staff on Wednesday, Feb. 11, in the Ross Fireplace Lounge. In its May 2015 meeting, the Board of Trustees approved the design for the Ridgeline complex, and Burger said the plan met the College’s current accessibility standards.

Burger noted that stopping the project would have tremendous costs. “Site work is complete and most of the foundations are in place,” he said. We also have signed agreements with contractors and with our partner on the project who, in turn, has agreements with its lenders. But we are investigating what changes are possible with the current building footprint.”

Project Manager for the Residences Tom McGinn declined to state how much KCP is spending on their construction. He said that the College’s share is about $1.5 million, which is to bring utilities such as water and sewage to the site. The completion date of the project, which broke ground on Sept. 23, is still set for Sept. 2016. McGinn estimated that it is probably 15 or 20 percent complete. Concrete foundations are in, floor slabs are being poured, framing has started, and utility infrastructure is up. Their plan is to complete the concrete by the end of November and get the buildings enclosed so the interiors can be worked on during the winter.

When asked the cost of installing elevators into the buildings at this stage in construction, McGinn estimated in the millions. “In the several millions, at a minimum, and probably at least a year of redesigning and reworking and redoing,” he said. “To do so, we would have to either extensively remake the work that’s in place, or just tear it out completely. The footprint gets bigger, the framing plans change, the wood trusses and the roof trusses that are ordered and already stacked up on the site, they all wouldn’t work anymore. The buildings might not even fit on the footprint—so then we would have to re-permit and redesign. And stop, essentially. Just stop. And what you have would go away.”

Representatives from the College have estimated that it will cost five million to make the three townhouses visitable on all floors and up to an additional three million in fees for breaking the contract. Patton has indicated that this expense is too great.

“With great regret, given all the other educational obligations we have and our limited resources, I cannot see how we can justify such a large expense,” she said.