Drenched dorms debacle

Students left in limbo after Cuyamaca flooding

SASHA BUKHTIYAROVA / CONTRIBUTOR / THE USD VISTA

At approximately 2:30 a.m on Tuesday, April 11, USD sophomore Charles Lorenzo had a rude awakening.

 “I was laying in my bed trying to go to sleep, and then the next thing I know, I got blasted in the face with water, and I was soaking wet,” Lorenzo said. “I was drowning.” 

With the fire alarms blaring, students vacated the Cuyamaca short hall of the Alcalá Vista apartments. It was here that Lorenzo was able to find his RA who then called Public Safety to the scene. 

“I was just in this shock of being extremely wet, cold, all my clothes are wet — I’m in my underwear and a towel outside, just freezing my a** off,” he recalled. 

Lorenzo is one of about fourteen students – according to USD’s Associate Director of Media Relations, Elena Gomez – whose apartments were flooded the morning of April 11.  “The flood was caused by a damaged sprinkler in one apartment, and there is no evidence of a malfunction or issues with USD’s infrastructure or piping,” Gomez clarified.

Residential Life sent an email to most affected students on Tuesday night that provided instructions to them on how to move forward.

 “We ask you to pack all your items that are dry by 5 p.m. tomorrow (April 13 [Thursday]), in the boxes provided to you today,” the email stated. “USD will relocate the remainder of your dry items to your temporary space tomorrow. Do not remove any items contaminated by water.” 

USD sophomores Sofia Morales and Cecelia Baker, who were directly adjacent to the flooded room, received this email and followed the instructions it provided. Due to their proximity to the flooded dorm, all of their belongings were also soaked. Both Morales and Baker received temporary housing reassignment the night of the flood, and packed their belongings accordingly on Wednesday, after receiving the email. 

The morning of April 13, however, Baker went to her old dorm to make sure everything was packed correctly. 

“I go over in the morning to make sure [my belongings are packed],” Baker recounted. “My things have been scattered throughout the apartment, [movers] are putting wet things in cardboard boxes, sealing them up, and packing them for the movers to bring them to the [temporary housing in the] UTAs. I want my money back for these things, and they were going to throw out my mattress topper that I paid for.” 

Morales shared a similar experience with moving her items as well. “[The movers]  literally delivered a box of sopping-wet stuff covered in the contaminated water to our new place. It was supposed to be [left] there [in the flooded dorm], for the insurance,” she said. “I said [to the movers], ‘do not touch our stuff; the university told us to leave it out for insurance claims. It’s wet, it’s contaminated — don’t touch it.’”

USD recognized the urgency of the situation, and responded as quickly as they could. “The university responded to the situation immediately,” Assistant Vice President and Dean of Students, Nicole Whitner, said. “ In collaboration with an outside contractor, we are assessing the extent of the water damage to the buildings and property and developing a repair plan,”

Most of the affected students were immediately relocated to temporary housing, although this wasn’t the case for everyone. USD sophomore Natalie Burchett, who shares a wall with the students directly below the flooded dorm, was not informed of her need to relocate until Monday, April, 17.

 “They haven’t really been communicating with me until the last minute,” she said. “The whole week I’ve just been sleeping on my couch, and they moved all of my stuff out before they told me I was going to get a new place. They don’t really tell me anything that’s going on, until they decide that something’s happening, and then when they tell me about that, it’s right before it does.” 

Burchett did not receive the email from Residential Life the night of the incident. After spending the week on her couch after her bedroom was flooded, was alerted on Friday morning that she would be relocated.

 “People [from Hospitality Services] came in at nine in the morning and were like, ‘We’re going to take everything out of your room,’” Burchett recalled. “And I was like, ‘Oh, ok, I didn’t know that. Ok cool.’ So I spent the whole day packing up all of my stuff.” Instead, Burchett alone moved her dry items to her temporary housing on Friday evening. 

It was the following Monday that Burchett became aware that the university didn’t know where some of her items were. “It’s not that they haven’t communicated to me about where [my clothes] are,” Burchett explained. “It’s just that they literally don’t know where they are.” 

An email sent to Burchett by Residential Life on Monday, April 17, stated, “We are still waiting to hear back about your items that were sent out for cleaning and/or inspection, but we will hopefully have an update for you by tomorrow.” As of Sunday, April 23, Burchett had received no such update. 

While flooding of this scale is unprecedented in the Alcalá Vista apartments, Baker and Morales experienced a similar issue the previous semester in the same dorm.

“There was a fire hydrant, someone was fixing it and they messed up, and it exploded right into our room, like spewing directly into our room. We called [Residential Life], and they were like ‘I think you just left your window open and it rained.’ Like no… There’s a fire hydrant that exploded right by our room,” Baker recounted. 

Morales, whose room was also flooded by the hydrant last semester, was equally dissatisfied by the university’s response. “Last time our room was flooded and we asked for reimbursements, the school didn’t give us anything,” she added. “Don’t make me feel stupid, just because you’re the university and I’m a student. It feels like you’re belittling us just because we’re lower.”

Morales and Baker were not the only students who experienced issues within their time in the Alcalá Vista dorms. Lorenzo elaborated upon previous issues he experienced before the flooding initiated within his apartment. 

“There were problems with the room the entire semester,” he said. “It was just an old room. We had to get our fridge replaced, we had to get our microwave replaced over break. Our fridge had to get fixed, the water was always leaking in the shower, and it was just a bunch of little problems like that.” 

Residential Life was unable to provide comment on the flooding within the dorms, and explained that Media Relations was preparing a statement and would be in contact with the Vista soon. 

Maintenance within student housing is important to the university, and Gomez, Associate Director of Media Relations, advised on what to look out for. “If anyone observes a damaged sprinkler head, leaking water or issues with any fire suppression systems in a campus building they should immediately contact Public Safety. Nothing should be hung from or affixed to any sprinkler head, fire alarm or fire suppression system,” she explained. 

Currently, many of the affected students remain in a state of limbo, awaiting estimates for their damaged goods, and instructions on how to move forward. Some students, like Lorenzo, Morales, and Baker, were offered permanent housing for the rest of the semester, while others, like Burchett and her roommates, were provided temporary housing for the upcoming weeks and are still unsure of the duration of their stay. 

“Moving in the middle of the school year is not easy, especially with a month left,” Lorenzo said. “But the school’s been helpful, it’s just very difficult. It’s a difficult situation.” 

For Morales and Baker, the relocation situation was made much more difficult on Tuesday night, the week after the flooding, when Baker noticed something strange in the kitchen of her temporary housing. 

“I was just looking at the floor and I saw a couple bugs,” she said. “I thought they were fruit flies, but then I looked closer, and I realized they were termites. I looked all around the kitchen, and they were everywhere, just crawling everywhere.”

The following day, Wednesday, April 19, both Morales and Baker attended class, unsure of what their housing situation would be, while their parents spoke with the university about the termites. “We’re all just so exhausted, so fed up, and it just feels like it’s one thing after another, and nothing’s really getting solved,” Baker stated. 

It was at around 6 p.m. on Wednesday that Morales received a call from her mother, Tracy Morales, with an update on the situation. Mrs. Morales had been speaking with someone within Parent and Family Relations at the university, who explained that with the relocations, there were no open dorms on campus, or emergency apartments available with Pacific Ridge. However, they were able to negotiate with the Pacific Ridge Apartments to allow Morales, Baker, and their two suitemates to be relocated for the duration of the semester in apartments maintained as corporate units reserved for workers at Pacific Ridge. 

Additionally, the university sought to reconcile with the four roommates by providing an opportunity for them and their parents to speak with Assistant Vice President and Dean of Students, Nicole Whitner, who also provided a statement.

“My heart goes out to the students impacted, as we know this has been an unanticipated challenge. While there are many circumstances out of our control, I am so appreciative of my team and my colleagues for all they’re doing to respond to our students’ needs as they arise,” Whitner said.

“It will be about how the school handled the situation and how they communicated,” Mrs. Morales explained. “That’s your forum… If something happens again… the school recognizes this has an impact on the student’s ability to learn and sleep and function.”

Both Morales and Baker were overjoyed by this news, after their weeklong housing debacle. “This is the best report we’ve ever gotten,” Baker exclaimed.

The university will be continuing to deal with the effects of the flooding in the upcoming weeks. Students are advised to look out for any damaged infrastructure within their dorms and to reach out to Residential Life if they notice anything unusual that could indicate a problem.