Oxy Conducts Health and Safety Room Inspections

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Author: Amy Withey

Last week, October 22-26, Residence Life and Housing Services organized campus-wide health and safety inspections of all residence hall rooms. According to Director of Residence Life and Housing Kecia Baker, the inspection was not prompted by any specific reason.

Last year, Residence Life did not conduct any inspections, but according to Baker, inspections had always been conducted in past years. “Every school conducts these inspections; we are not the only school,” she said. She also said that the purpose was simply to “make sure there are no health hazards such as overloading circuits and fire hazards.”

Resident Advisors (RAs) were instructed to briefly survey each room and went in pairs to ensure there were no accusations of burglary. If no illegal item or safety hazard was found, the RAs were told to complete a safety form given to them by Housing. If an illegal item or safety hazard was found, the guilty student was given between 24 and 48 hours to remove the item. Resident Advisor of Stearns Claire Anderson (sophomore) said that she believed the inspections were not an infringement of students’ rights and were in the “best interest of residents to have the building safe.” She also said that it was a “time-consuming project,” but that she understood it was part of her duties as an RA.

Some students questioned their rights during the inspections. According to the Occidental Student Handbook, there are circumstances when the College has the right to inspect a student’s room.

The Occidental Student Handbook states that “the College will respect the privacy rights of students, and will not authorize law enforcement officials to enter rooms without a proper warrant. Room entry by College Officials is authorized under the following conditions, and the College will make a good faith effort to contact students prior to room entry:

1. Regular or Unscheduled Maintenance, i.e. Facilities needs to enter a student’s room in the normal course of conducting maintenance.

2. Health, Sanitation, and Vacancy Checks, i.e. normally scheduled room checks for purposes of ensuring sanitary or vacated residence halls.

3. Safety, Welfare, and Nuisance Checks, i.e. safety concerns or public nuisance like missing students or unattended alarm clocks.

4. Policy Violations, i.e. alcohol/drugs, sexual assault, weapons, or battery.”

“The only goal [of the inspections] is to make sure the students are safe,” Baker said.

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