On Thursday, March 27, several faculty members from Campus Residences provided a presentation to the Undergraduate Student Government (USG) Senate about updated housing policies for the 2025-26 academic year.

Catherine-Mary Rivera, the assistant vice president of Campus Residences, began by discussing the responsibilities of several different departments within Campus Residences. 

Rivera introduced Unity Watts-Bailey, the director of residential education for apartments, suites and the Southampton campus, who discussed the significance of this department.

“Residential education is the programmatic staff or professional staff that live in and support the programmatic piece,” Watts-Bailey said. She also explained that this includes residential advisors (RA) and residence hall directors who oversee RAs. 

Watts-Bailey then explained that residential education is designed to support students’ academic, social and personal growth through “community building and belonging, academic integration, transitional support and diversity inclusion.” 

Rivera then presented the Dormitory Income Fund budget and broke down the costs from the past academic year using a pie chart. The chart showed the budget of $126 million and listed the areas where the money goes toward and how much money was distributed to each area. 

Of the $126 million, she clarified that 31% goes toward paying off the mortgages of 63 dormitory buildings on Stony Brook University’s main campus.

She continued to explain that another 17% goes toward maintaining and operating the buildings to ensure a clean environment. The pie chart broke down other expenses, such as fringe benefits, business operations and utilities. 

Rivera explained there are some specific departments the budget helps fund, including the Stony Brook University Police Department, Emergency Management and Division of Student Affairs. 

She assured that leftover funds go toward the multi-million dollar in backup of deferred maintenance. 

“We have ongoing maintenance or renovation [in] some of our buildings,” Rivera said. “The reality is, they’re from the 1960s, so without maintaining or trying to keep them up to speed, [it can lead to future issues].”

Afterward, the presentation shifted to Jeffery MiWe, the senior director for housing administration and strategic planning. MiWe explained that their department mainly handles room assignments, occupancy, management and policies within their business practice.

They then discussed numerous changes to upcoming housing policies, the first one being a new student Radius Policy, which was introduced last year. They clarified that it will now be fully advertised and outlined to incoming freshman, transfer and graduate students. 

The policy states that students whose home address is within a 30-mile distance to the University can place a housing deposit, but they cannot move further with their housing application until Campus Residences evaluates housing availability after the deposit deadlines. The deadline for undergraduate students is May 1 and the deadline for graduate students is May 15. Students will be refunded if housing is unavailable. 

“It doesn’t mean they will not be housed,” MiWe said. “It just means we need to look at everyone else’s demand first and make sure that we can house people that do not have the ability to commute.” 

MiWe said the policy change was not received well by students since there was an unexpected growth in enrollment. They explained to the USG Senate that part of the limited dorming is due to different housing options compared to other universities. 

“The demand keeps increasing … I think many of you are aware that the off-campus market is not like other campuses where you see off-campus complex[es] for college students,” MiWe explained.

They reassured that Campus Residences understands many of these students may not be able to commute, but many out-of-state and international students require housing to attend. 

“I know some of these students may not have an ability to commute, but that’s very different than an out-of-state student or an international [student],” MiWe said. “We hope to notify [those within a 30-mile radius] by the end of May [or] early June [about housing availability], but it is a way to help manage housing.”

MiWe moved onto another change within business practices with the implementation of a Class Enrollment Policy. Every year, according to them, there are many last-minute cancellations from students who have transferred out of the University but failed to inform Campus Residences.

Due to these cancellations, they decided to implement a new policy that states undergraduate students are expected to be enrolled at least three weeks prior to when classes start with a minimum of three credits. If students are not enrolled in at least three credits, their housing agreement will be cancelled.

Their policy assures that newly admitted students who have begun working toward enrollment, such as submitting immunizations and are awaiting advising appointments, are considered students in the process of enrolling.

“I think that’s going to be a good policy change [to] be able to get people off the waitlist … [to] be able to house people waiting assignments and really manage occupancy a little bit better,” MiWe said. “[The policy applies to both] our first years and new transfers as well, if they have housing, but they will have some flexibility if they’re in [the] process of meeting with an advisor.”

Lastly, they explained that what was once a required deposit for housing will now be replaced by a cancellation fee. MiWe continued to explain that typically students would have to pay a deposit by April, and if they canceled later than April, Campus Residences would keep the $200 deposit. Now this has been extended, allowing returning students until the end of May to cancel.

With this change, they increased the cancellation fee overall. Now, if students cancel their housing plans in July, it is a $300 fee; after Aug. 1, it is a $400 fee and if it’s the Sunday before classes start or later, it is a $500 fee.

“That’s a new change immediate [as of] this year to allow people to have some more time to make decisions,” MiWe said.