Holiday Inn Students Out

UM checks out of the Inn
The 110 University of Miami students still residing in the Holiday Inn, across from campus on US-1, will have to be out by the end of the calendar year.
The contract between the University and the hotel only lasts until Dec. 20, 2002.
This number is down from 140 students that were housed in the hotel at the beginning of the semester.
Last year, the first year that the University turned to the hotel for temporary housing, only 30 students were placed at the Holiday Inn.
Those living at the Holiday Inn are mostly continuing students whose previous living arrangements fell through or domestic and international transfer students.
Jon Baldessari, Assistant Director of Residence Halls for Marketing, Assignments and Conference Housing, foresees housing stability next semester. He anticipates no difficulty with fitting everybody into a room.
“Based on expected numbers, with the assumed number of cancellations and new students, we should be fine.”
To accommodate the extraordinarily large number of on-campus residents, study lounges in the Stanford and Hecht towers have been converted into permanent dormitories, complete with desks, carpeting and cable modems, at least for the next several years.
“They’re no study lounges anymore,” said Baldessari.
No freshman students were temporarily assigned to the Holiday Inn this semester. Nearly 80 were briefly living in double rooms with resident assistants.
“They were all reassigned within the first two weeks,” said Baldessari.
Because of the high density of students living on campus, students who currently occupy a double room by themselves will be assigned a new roommate for the spring semester.
Students who fail to remove their belongings from one half of their room will be assessed a $50 fine and may be removed from on-campus housing.
Students who wish to stay on campus between the fall and spring semesters must fill out an Intersession Housing Application at the Department of Residence Halls office, in Eaton 153.
Apartment area students may continue to live in their apartments over the winter break because they are already being charged for that period.
However, residents of Mahoney and Pearson must pay $400 to cover the costs of operations for the intersession period. Students who live in Hecht, Stanford, or Eaton and wish to stay over break must find someone in Mahoney, Pearson or the apartments with whom to share a room.
Students who are leaving the University at the end of the fall semester need to fill out a Request for Release form to receive a refund of their housing deposit, which also may be found in the office of the Department of Residence Halls.
Residence halls close at noon on Thursday, Dec. 19 for non-graduating students.
Students graduating in December must leave their dorms or apartments by noon the following day.
Effective January 2003, the State of Florida will require that all students living on campus must either document receipt of meningitis and hepatitis-B immunization or sign a waiver that they do not wish to be vaccinated.
The Department of Residence Halls did not give information on how the housing situation will be for the fall semester of 2003.
Housing sign-up for the fall will be in late March and early April.