By BRITTANIE MORRIS
The current Centennial Apartments, located south of campus at 380 N. 1020 East, will change the way the complex is run as of Fall Semester 2006. Charter Housing, a division of BYU, will replace Centennial Apartments with on-campus style housing.
Roman Gardens and Centennial ll are under the same management and will continue to function independent of BYU.
“It’s the management’s choice of what to do, but I think they should have told us a couple of days before the housing fair instead of a couple days after it,” said Emily Ciervo, 21, from Reading, Penn., majoring in sociology at BYU. Ciervo was planning on staying in Centennial Apartments after graduation in April but now will be unable to do so.
Under new guidelines, Centennial Apartments will add a few features to their policies. The first and most major change that will occur is the tenant school enrollment requirement. Starting in the fall, only BYU students will be allowed to reside in Charter Housing.
Centennial Apartments has long been the popular housing spot for students of Paul Mitchell: The School, Utah Valley State College and college-age young adults attending the LDS institute program on BYU campus. However, these students will be forced to find new housing next fall.
Charter Housing will also implement approximately five or six “on-site managers” that will serve as an intermediary between the Housing Office and the tenants.
“On-site managers will be different from resident assistants found in on-campus housing,” said Stephanie Partridge, Centennial Apartment assistant office manager. “This won’t be like the dorms. We want tenants to understand that.”
However, some occupants are skeptical of the necessity of such a change.
“I think that having [resident assistants] in an apartment complex is useless,” said Michelle Samuelsen, from Ithaca, N.Y., majoring in piano performance at BYU. “The point of moving to apartments from on-campus housing is to be independent and solve your own problems.”
However, this change will have little effect on some BYU students. Elizabeth Moster, from Cincinnati, majoring in English, said she is planning on staying at Charter Housing despite the changes.
“I planned on staying here until I graduated anyway, but I think it will be interesting to see if the complex stays the same like they said it will.”
Speculations as to a huge increase in the number of freshman tenants have also reached the ears of many current residents. Due to the planned downscaling of housing in Deseret Towers and the addition of Wyview as on-campus housing, many students are skeptical as to whether off-campus will remain dominantly occupied by upper-classmen.
However, Centennial management said they expect everything to stay much the same.
“We do not expect a larger number of freshmen than normal,” Partridge said. “DT will still be up next year and Wyview has also been added, as I understand.”
