The University of Guelph isn’t doing enough to curtail large parties, says a father living in U of G family housing after an incident last weekend in which he says more than 30 people partied in the unit next to his.
Michael, who asked that his last name not be used for concerns about reprisals, lives in family housing in K Block at U of G and said he had to call Campus Community Police three times on Saturday to report the gathering. He said the party started at about 10 p.m. and continued into the early morning hours with more than 30 people present.
“The first time the cops came they said they weren’t going to ask them to leave, just keep it down and then the cops left and as soon they were out of earshot just before the door closed they were laughing and were mocking the police and turned up the noise even more,” said Michael in a phone interview.
He is concerned about the possible exposure to COVID-19 guests may have had during the large gathering in the small unit next to where he lives with his wife and two-year-old daughter.
Michael said the campus police didn’t seem to know the university’s own rules about parties and who is allowed to be in the units and who is not.
According to U of G’s own policies, masks must be worn in interior spaces where two metres of distance cannot be maintained between people.
“I was dumbstruck, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing,” said Michael of the sight of guest after guest coming and going from the room, most without masks, drinking and sharing snacks from the same containers.
“I would like the campus police to ramp up their training, because they had zero idea of campus policy.”
Michael said he is hoping to see someone held accountable for the gathering.
“I don’t want to see anyone fined $10,000 or anything like that, I just want it to be addressed and for it to never happen again,” he said.
Reached by email on Wednesday, the university’s manager of news services Deirdre Healey said the University is aware of this incident and is taking it very seriously.
“Appropriate action has been taken by Student Housing and Campus Community Police to ensure the health and safety of the U of G community and the greater Guelph community,” said Healey.
GuelphToday reached out to Campus Community Police for comment and was directed to contact the university’s communications team.
Healey did not say what specific action had been taken in the incident, but said the Campus Community Police is taking an educative approach to handling incidents involving students.
“Under our non-academic misconduct policy and off-campus community standards, the university will respond to student violations of COVID-19 public health guidelines,” said Healey. “Any disciplinary action taken will follow the university’s non-academic misconduct policy and off-campus community standards protocol.”
To date, the U of G has reported two cases of COVID-19 on campus, one in Guelph and another at its Ridgetown campus.
