Occupancy Facts

Solid Reasons for College Town Occupancy Limits

Mark McIntyre opined on Oct. 4 that occupancy limits for unrelated individuals are “immoral.” I’ll contribute some context and facts, since McIntyre’s blanket condemnation left little room for either.

First, hundreds of U.S. cities, and nearly all college towns, limit unrelated occupants in residential structures. The City of Boulder recently surveyed occupancy limits of 60 peer U.S. college towns. Fifty-five percent of them allow only three unrelated or less, and 32 percent allow only two unrelated. Online searches reveal hundreds more U.S. cities with occupancy limits.

So by McIntyre’s definition, hundreds of U.S. cities and college towns are “immoral.” Should we notify these cities that a Boulder Planning Board member deems them “immoral?” (It seems the least we can do is inform them of their “immorality.” Undoubtedly this will gain Boulder lots more friends.)

Second, occupancy limits, particularly in college towns, have far more to do with practicality than morality. One needs only conjure the movie “Animal House” and its depiction of crowded, out of control off-campus houses. Unfortunately, many neighborhoods near universities experience similar situations every night.

It doesn’t appear that McIntyre lives in a CU-adjacent neighborhood where a majority of homes serve as rentals, most commonly to students. If so, McIntyre repeats the error of many Boulder current and former Council members: “If I don’t experience rental issues in my neighborhood, they don’t exist.”

Rather than being grateful for being spared, and empathic for those who aren’t, our city leaders often opine from safe, comfortable distances about occupancy limits – fully knowing that increasing or eliminating occupancy limits will have zero impact in their quiet, mostly owner-occupied neighborhoods. Meanwhile, even the slightest changes can and likely will push some Boulder neighborhoods past the tipping point.

McIntyre would do well to read Family Displacement in Central Austin: Approaches for Regulating the High Occupancy Unit. Austin hosts the University of Texas and temporarily raised occupancy limits to six unrelated, before reversing course after disastrous results.

Per the report: “A balanced, diverse community is a strong community. But today, our community (Austin) is losing a most important component of that diversity: its families…It may be irreversible, and many areas have reached the tipping point. The trend began near the campus, but there is evidence that High Occupancy Units are spreading elsewhere in the City of Austin.” (With presumably the same effect.)

We’re already seeing this in Boulder. Certain blocks in Uni Hill, Goss Grove, East Aurora, and Martin Acres are no longer tenable for families and working professionals. Acquaintances in these neighborhoods report families increasingly leaving their neighborhoods and Boulder for good, finally giving up on a city that prioritizes one- to four-year-resident students, over families and their long-term, multi-generational contributions to the community.

Third, families have clear delineations of authority and responsibility. If a neighbor’s teenagers play loudly outside, late at night, you have reasonable confidence that speaking to either parent the next day will improve things – regardless of which parent it is, or whether they were even at home during the disturbance.

Not so, with unrelated households. Many of us experience the following when contacting them the next day. Occupant: “Oh, I don’t know, dude, I wasn’t here last night.” (“Well, do you know which of your roommates was?”) “Maybe Tom, I dunno.” (“Is Tom here?”) “No.” (“Do you know when he’ll be back?”) “No, but you’re gonna have to talk to him.”

Of course, if one lives a comfortable, safe distance from CU, one doesn’t experience this every week and is therefore very unfamiliar with this added barrier to resolution, with unrelated households.

Finally, city leaders hold the wildly misinformed belief that they “fixed all code enforcement issues.” In truth, the City fixed practically nothing: The one new noise law says that if an officer happens to be on your street and can hear a disturbance within 200 feet, the officer can write a ticket, without a complainant. Huh? The chances of one of Boulder’s very few patrol officers being on my street during a disturbance are astronomical. Life is considerably more challenging, the closer one lives to CU. I wish City leaders would be more cognizant of this, before opining.