Even as the Greek community has brought many students to attend parties on Professors Row over the past weekends, many Tufts fraternities are currently not legally permitted to host such functions while they await licensing approval from the City of Somerville.
In Somerville, lodging house licenses are mandated for buildings in which four or more unrelated residents are living together. Greek houses need these licenses in order to house residents and host social functions, but a majority of the organizations on campus are currently operating without them.
This issue was thrown into the limelight recently when Tufts University Police Department (TUPD) disbanded parties at Alpha Epsilon Pi (AEPi) and Alpha Tau Omega (ATO) on the nights of Sept. 4 and Sept. 5 respectively, according to TUPD Sgt. Robert McCarthy.
Sophomore Yulia Korovikov, chair of the Tufts Community Union Senate's Administration and Policy (A&P) Committee, said that Somerville would approve the licenses on or around Oct. 1.
As an interim measure to preempt insurance and liability issues while they wait for Somerville to grant their licenses, Dean of Student Affairs Bruce Reitman has required the Greek houses occupying privately owned properties — Delta Upsilon, Theta Delta Chi (123), Zeta Psi, AEPi and ATO — to obtain signatures of approval from their national organization, insurance company and housing corporation before being permitted to host parties.
"We need to make sure that the housing corporations of the fraternities, who own the properties, are in agreement that even without having the actual lodging house license, they are okay with having social functions," Reitman said.
Of these five, Reitman said he has received partial paperwork from Zeta Psi and complete paperwork from 123 with these signatures.
While 123 is allowed to host parties, the other four do not have permission, leading TUPD to break up the parties at AEPi and ATO.
TUPD Capt. Mark Keith said that while fraternities provide a social outlet for students, liability issues necessitate requiring the extra permission.
"I think the dean puts those rules in place for their own protection," he said. "If there was an issue or if there was an incident, the dean is just trying to save them from liability issues."
In addition to 123, Chi Omega and Sigma Nu — which occupy Tufts−owned houses — are also allowed to host parties, although the respective presidents of the organizations said they were unsure if they had obtained their licenses yet, as the university handled the paperwork.
The last five houses — Alpha Omicron Pi, Alpha Phi, Sigma Phi Epsilon, Theta Chi and Zeta Beta Tau — similarly have not obtained their licenses. They are, however, occupying houses owned by Walnut Hill Properties, a housing corporation that is affiliated with the university, which has agreed to let their members live and host functions in their properties even as they await final licensing approval from the city, according to Reitman.
Before a zoning board will accept a lodging−house license application, all five city inspectional services — the fire department, police department, electrical inspector, health inspector and building inspector — must approve the house, according to Reitman.
The organizations living in Tufts−owned houses — Chi Omega and Sigma Nu — were granted licenses due to the speed at which they completed inspections and repairs, Reitman said.
Bruce Ketchen, general manager of Walnut Hill, said that Walnut Hill's fraternity and sorority properties have met the conditions for the license and may function normally pending the license's approval.
Ketchen said that Walnut Hill is not involved in rules regarding fraternity social functions and as such does not expressly rule out these functions.
"We do not take any position on parties," he said. "Those would need to be regulated by the university."
Tufts allows chapters to open for the year only after they have obtained these inspections and submitted an application for the lodging−house license, according to Reitman.
Senior Danny Wittels, president of Walnut Hill−owned Theta Chi, said his house has already hosted social functions this year, thanks to Walnut Hill's approval. Peer fraternities, he said, have not been as lucky.
"The only reason we know about that issue is because other houses have had that issue in the last couple of weeks," he said, referencing the lack of permission to host parties.
Bruce Ratain, a senior who is an AEPi brother, said the university should facilitate the process of obtaining the license for fraternities occupying privately owned properties.
"It's definitely conspicuous that none of the non−Tufts−owned houses got their paperwork through," Ratain, who also chaired the A&P Committee last year, said. "Why didn't it notify or try to assist this other segment of Greek life?"
Reitman said this licensing process could take more or less time for each house depending on its need for repairs. He said that Tufts' Facilities Department takes care of Tufts−owned houses, making their repairs, and subsequently the approval process, easier.
"They're in a position to address those issues on an ongoing basis," he said.
Both Ratain and Korovikov said that it would be beneficial to the entire Tufts community for the Greek houses to have formal approval to host social events. From a public safety standpoint, fraternity parties even have an upside, Ratain said.
"Frat parties aggregate students in known, centralized, on−campus locations, where both police and [emergency medical] services are readily accessible," Ratain said. "When fraternity parties are prevented from happening, we have students wandering around the larger Somerville community late at night, often potentially alone, where TUPD cannot monitor or patrol the area that the students are in."
