College Area Residents Hope Pen Is Mightier Than the ‘Mini-Dorm’

Homeowners in the San Diego State University area are mad as hell and don’t want to take it anymore.

Two of them have started a newsletter that some say has rallied an entire neighborhood against the crush of “mini-dorms.”

“This has had a huge effect on me,” said Joann Light, 49, editor of the Watchdog Newsletter, which published its first issue last June. “I don’t want to wake up in the morning to a chorus of loud obscenities. I get tired of seeing beer cans and condoms left on my lawn. I get tired of people trying to break into my house or garage. I get tired of ceaseless noise, loud music and no consideration.”

Jane Carpenter, 67, is equally enraged. She lives only a few blocks away, not far from the intersection of Montezuma and Catoctin, and is so incensed she’s devoted her days to helping Light print and distribute the newsletter.

The Watchdog Newsletter now has a circulation of more than 500. Among those it is mailed to regularly are Police Chief William Kolender and City Councilwoman Judy McCarty, who represents homeowners in the SDSU area.

“I think they’re maturing rapidly,” McCarty said of Light and Carpenter. “In the beginning, they were more strident than substantive. Now they’re becoming more substantive. I’m pleased to see them making a contribution to the community.

Neighbor Involvement

“They’ve gotten the neighborhood involved,” she said. “We all hate mini-dorms. There’s not a soul who likes them, except maybe landlords, and they’re making a killing. Most of these landlords don’t live in the area, so they don’t care.”

A mini-dorm is a single-family home that a landlord chooses to rent out to several students, sometimes a dozen or more. Some three- and four-bedroom houses have as many as 17 students living in them.

The City of San Diego has grappled with the mini-dorm issue for several years. Last May, the City Council--over the objections of university students--approved an ordinance designed to limit the number of students who can legally live in rental houses.

The new regulations require a minimum of 80 square feet of sleeping space, at least one bathroom for every four tenants, and additional off-street parking. The ordinance applies only to the SDSU area and only to single-family homes that are for rent.

The tenants of mini-dorms often are accused of being less than good neighbors--of behaving like food-fighting, beer-can-throwing refugees from “Animal House.” They seem especially vexing to resident homeowners looking forward to quiet years in houses they’ve occupied for decades.

Some students in the area have dubbed Light, Carpenter and the newsletter they circulate “vigilantes.”

Hooligans Drive Them Crazy

“I’ve been called everything from a vigilante to a communist conspirator,” Light said with a chuckle. “But the hooliganism of these students has made us all a bit crazy.”

Light and Carpenter are members of the San Diego State University Area Home Owners Assn., whose membership has grown to 350. The Watchdog Newsletter has helped to foment opposition to mini-dorms and put pressure on elected officials to protect the interests of the homeowners.

Today, City Atty. John Witt--who also receives a copy of the newsletter in the mail each month--will hear a complaint from Light and Carpenter asking that students who make nuisances of themselves be cited and fined.

Light said such incidents have included fistfights and drug deals in front of her house. She plans a petition drive to ban drinking on the streets and sidewalks.

Neighborhood police patrols have become routine, according to Light, who called them “better late than never.” She said the mini-dorm problem has existed for 10 years, became a crisis five years ago and is now “intolerable.”

Students who live in the neighborhood describe Light and Carpenter as “zealots” and say the police patrols are excessive and unwarranted.

Sheehan, 24, a senior at SDSU, who asked that his full name not be published, said older residents feel threatened by the mere presence of students in the neighborhood--”A sign of the times,” he called it--and have overreacted by making life miserable for the students.

He calls it “a generational conflict.”

“They see their homes losing their value just by us being here,” he said. “Because SDSU is so overcrowded--because we have to live somewhere--they blame us more or less for existing, especially in their neighborhood. We do have a lot of people living around here now, and there’s a lot of traffic, especially on weekends.”

“Yeah!” one of his roommates shouted out. “Especially on Saturdays, when guys’ll be drivin’ 60 miles an hour down the street!”

Sheehan said he and four other students share a three-bedroom house for $1,600 a month. He said he knows of one house nearby in which 16 women share very cramped quarters.

“Even so, this is not a noisy, out-of-control neighborhood,” he said. “That is just ridiculous, as is this whole controversy. It’s just a few crazy homeowners overreacting. It’s sad to see so many people leaving, fleeing. They’re afraid their property values are plummeting, so they’re panicking. It’s all so unnecessary.”

Light, a licensed real estate appraiser, said property values have indeed plummeted because of noise and vandalism perpetrated by students. She said one house on Alumni Drive, on which 10 mini-dorms are located, recently sold for $165,000, even though comparable homes in the area have sold for as much as $200,000.

Daughter Born There

“I’m not gonna leave, because I refuse to be a victim,” Light said. “My daughter was born in this house. I’m gonna fight. I like the area and the home.”

Light has lived in the neighborhood 20 years, Carpenter for 34. Each woman raised two children there. Their view is: Why should we have to go?

Light admits fury has sometimes gotten the best of her reason. She and Carpenter succeeded in removing three members of the College Area Community Council--an advisory body to the San Diego City Council--because, in their view, the members failed to be responsive to the fears of neighbors besieged by the bad apples of the mini-dorms.

“In one sense, the action against CACC was a blow to the community,” said Councilwoman McCarty. “One person they got kicked off, Pat Hannum, had been president of the council for three years. She was right in the middle of revising the community plan. You hate to lose such experience.”

“They’ve calmed down,” McCarty said, “but I look forward to seeing them calm down even more. I’d like to see them more involved with solutions than to always be on the outside throwing stones. They have been very informative about problems in the area.”

Light wants the circulation of the Watchdog Newsletter to climb even higher. She wants “peace and quiet and control,” and says she can get it with police and other authorities cracking down on hooliganism to the point where it no longer exists--to the point where “a bunch of animal houses” are as calm as a golden pond.