Aaron Berkowitz – General Assignment Reporter
Some unfortunate Brownell Hall residents returned to SCSU from their turkey dinners and family celebrations only to find multiple dehumidifiers and water damage in their dorms as a result of a flood that transpired inside the building over the Thanksgiving break.
“We are still assessing the damage,” said Robert Sheeley, associate vice president for Capital Budgeting and Facilities Operations.
Janirhar Scotland, junior psychology major, said she was shocked, angry, and anxious to see the damage done to her room when she received a phone call over the break, from a resident advisor, notifying her that her room had suffered damages during the flood.
“Someone called and asked me to identify which side of the room I stayed in,” said Scotland. “They told me a pipe in the building had exploded and there was a lot of damage to my things. All of my clothes got wet, a lot of food got wet, and some of my DVD’s got damaged.”
Sheeley said the pipe burst was a result of work done over the summer by an outside contractor installing new showers in Brownell.
“One of the connections on half inch water supply line separated,” said Sheeley. “The contractor has been contacted and will be held responsible.”
The Facilities Operations webpage on the SCSU website said their mission is to provide students with the highest quality of service. It also says they encourage students to voice their suggestions on how to continue to improve the campus by contacting their office, not just ignore them.
According to Weather.com, the possibility of pipes bursting is higher during times with colder weather. The site also said when water freezes it expands, so when the temperature outside decreases and water sits inside the pipes it can expand to the point where it leads to a pipe leaking and cause great damage.
“The damage was done,” said Scotland. “I remember when I lived in Chase Hall there was actually a sewage pipe that had exploded, it didn’t affect me, but I knew other people that got sewage and smells on their belongings.”
Scotland said she would like to be reimbursed by the school for the damages to her belongings, but if she was not paid back it would not be the end of the world for her. Although the Hall Directors on duty declined to comment on what happened over break, Scotland said she was instructed to take pictures of the damages to her belongings in order to receive compensation and staff members also washed her clothes that got wet.
Jasmine Campbell, junior public health major and Scotland’s roommate, said she didn’t receive a phone call from anyone in the building regarding the flood, but wasn’t too angry because there wasn’t much they could do to change what happened.
“I was a little agitated because I couldn’t sleep in my room.” said Campbell, “I was kind of like ‘What am I paying for?’ They said we could have stayed in another room, but I didn’t want to do that. Yeah they said they were sorry, but I feel like they just gave us a ‘sorry’ and that was it.”
Campbell said she’s over the incident now because they moved the machines out of her room and cleaned up most of the mess, but is still a little upset with how the situation was handled.
“The hall director said she emailed everyone that was affected,” said Campbell, “but I didn’t get an email and neither did two of my other roommates. They said they found out when they walked in and saw the machines.”
She went on to say she would have liked to hear more feedback from staff because she felt uninformed while everything was going on in her room and she was at home.
George Alexiadis, junior business major, said he found out about the damages to his room by his roommate and was shocked.
“I didn’t expect it,” said Alexiadis. “They did a good job cleaning up the water, but I was mad they left everything out of place. They just left our stuff piled up; I had to dig through things just to find my stuff.”
Despite his frustrations, Alexiadis said nothing too important got damaged during the flood except for a pair of his sneakers and a phone charger.
“I was mad at first,” said Alexiadis. “I was thinking of taking pictures of the damages to my sneakers but I haven’t done it yet and am still thinking about it.”
Both Alexiadis and Campbell said they will think again about what they will leave in their rooms when they leave now.
“I hadn’t really thought about it until now,” said Alexiadis. “I didn’t leave my laptop here and I’m pretty sure that if I did it would have gotten ruined.”
The fact that a newer piping job was the result of the flood raised some concerns for residents as well, said Campbell.
Alexiadis said he thinks all residents in Brownell should have been notified just to make everyone who lived in the building aware of what was going on around them.
“I didn’t know the pipe was supposed to be new,” said Alexiadis, “If it was new I wouldn’t expect something like this to happen. It’s not technically their fault and I don’t really take this whole thing to heart, but the fact they are saying they are not responsible unless we take pictures of the damages kind of gets on my nerves a little bit.”
