UD fraternity fights eviction
 

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The News Journal (Delaware)
April 23, 2003

Fraternity at UD fights its eviction
Tau Kappa Epsilon ordered out by Newark

By MICHELE BESSO
Bear Bureau reporter

A University of Delaware fraternity has filed a complaint in Chancery
Court against the city of Newark for taking away its fraternity house
zoning status and requiring its members to vacate their residence on
West Delaware Avenue.

A city building official, accompanied by a police officer, on Friday
told members of Tau Kappa Epsilon, a University of Delaware
undergraduate fraternity, that anyone remaining in the residence
after 9 a.m. Monday would be arrested, court records state. As of
Tuesday, members had not vacated the property.

"We're in ongoing discussions with the city in the hope that we can
resolve this in a way that is satisfactory to everybody this
semester," Mark Sisk, the group's attorney, said. "We sued
reluctantly because of the time pressure."

City Council recently passed an ordinance stating that all members
must immediately vacate the premises of any fraternity or sorority
that has its charter suspended or revoked by the University of
Delaware for more than a year.

The group, which owns the property at 43 W. Delaware Ave.,
permanently lost its status as a recognized university fraternity
April 11, court records state. The fraternity was cited for failure
to comply with previous sanctions against hazing, underage drinking
and violating the fire code at a party during winter session,
fraternity president Michael Halajian said. The property currently is
leased to 16 members who sign annual contracts, according to court
records. The fraternity was chartered in 1971 and currently has 30
active members.

The fraternity appealed the university's sanction to the university
appellate board, but the appeal was denied, Sisk said. He said the
fraternity has not decided whether to appeal the matter to another
court.

The city of Newark told the fraternity April 15 that its suspension
meant it no longer had city zoning status as a fraternal
organization, and its members had to leave the house within 72 hours,
the complaint states.

The fraternity is asking a judge for a temporary restraining order
against the city so it can't arrest any member of the fraternity,
enter the property, or take further action pending administrative
proceedings in the city. Lawyers also filed for an injunction to
direct the city to hear the case in its property maintenance or other
administrative board. They also are seeking damages and court fees of
an undisclosed amount.

"It's totally ridiculous what they're trying to do to us," Halajian
said. "To kick off 16 students in good standing with the university
as individuals. ... We're just asking to stay in the house for the
rest of the semester. We have to prepare for classes and finals. It's
a big hassle."

Tau Kappa Epsilon is the second fraternity to sue the city in a year.
In March, the Delta Eta. Corp., a nonprofit organization of
University of Delaware alumni from Pi Kappa Alpha, won its case
against the city in Superior Court in Wilmington. Delta Eta had
appealed City Council's decision to deny its request to build
off-campus apartments for its members. The issue will be brought back
to council next month.


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I don't think this town ordinance is legal.

What happens next week when the members of this chapter go out and legally rent a new house or a group of apartments? Will the town try to evict them again.

What if a school like Alfred decides to no longer sponser Greek Life? Does that mean every fraternity and sorority gets evicted even if they are complying with all local laws?

I hope they win the case.

This is just stupid.

Well they said Pike alumni won there case so there is a good chance TKE will win theirs. Hopefully they can get an injunction so that have aplace to live. Three days to find new housing isn't enough.

So they're accused of hazing, underage drinking, disobeying fire code, etc? If they were convicted I'd say them continuing to operate a house there is a danger to not only the residents but the people that party there.

The article says that they were already on suspension. Unless the school/city have taken pretty draconian measures against them I think they got what was coming to them.

They were accused. TKE IHQ didn't close them so there must not have been enough evidence to the fact. They lost school recogniton, so what they should still be able to keep the house even if that means taking the letters down and leave it as just a resisdence.

It may be legal because of the zoning. What the city is saying is that it's zoned as a fraternity/sorority house, so since they lost recognition on campus they are no longer seen as a chapter to the city. So their staying would be breaking zoning ordinance. I agree that 3 days is not enough time. Give them until the end of the semester to live their. I thnk this ordinance is more the city trying to crack down on underground chapters, you don't have recognition you don't get a chapter house. If they rent out a residential property that is not zoned as a fraternity house and don't put up letters they should be fine.

The article says that TKE owns the house. How the city kick them out of a property which they own? I don't understand how they can do that. Maybe order TKE to take letters off the building or whatever, but kick people out of their own property? Seems a bit much to me. Not only that, but so what they've had sanctions for underage drinking, hazing, and fire code violations at parties? It's COLLEGE!!! Don't act like some of ya'll don't drink underage. And ANYTHING today is considered hazing. People need to stop acting like a bunch of punks. I don't see how they can kick folks out their own house.

I don't agree that "anything can be considered hazing". That's a cop out. Especially if they were on probation for it in the first place. There are plenty of activities you can do in a chapter without hazing to build brotherhood (but that subject threatens to hijack the thread).

It just sounds like a case of they got what was coming to them to me. besides, when is the last time you saw TKE IHQ pull a charter?

The city can declare eminent domain and purchase the house. They could even use the excuse they want to add more green space or a homeless shelter or some other lame excuse. I don't know about DE, but in PA chaters can not own property, alumni associations can. Thus, if the house is known as a chapter house and they don't have campus recognition the city can proceed. The ground the city has to stand on is their zoning codes. If they aren't a recognized chapter by the university they can not occupy property zoned as a fraternity/sorority house.

I agree with KTSnake, when was the last time TKE IHQ pulled a charter.

What are you talking about, TKE is always pulling charters from chapters, and ktsnake you need to back off with your B.S. accusations

Can you give an example? Unless I can hear some evidence, I'm going to have to side with KTSnake and PSK480 -- I've never heard of TKE pulling a charter.

I'm not sure how I feel about this -- it seems to be a zoning issue, and the laws seem to be reasonable. Though, if the property just has zoning status as a fraternal organization and it doesn't specify whether or not the fraternity in question must be recognized, then they've definitely got a case. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out -- I'm sure lots of universities with unrecognized chapters still operating (Many of which are TKE chapters) are paying attention.

TKE at UD
 

TKE is no longer recognized by the University as a student organization. Their house is zoned as a fraternity house, since they are no longer recognized by the University as a fraternity they no longer 'qualify' to be zoned as a fraternity house. In addition the members of this GLO have been operating "underground" causing many problems for recognized fraternities (who follow campus regulations) and the sororities on campus (who can face sanctions if they are participating in 'underground' TKE events-even if it's unknowingly-ie they go to a late nite at the house-even though its not a 'TKE' event-its in the TKE house). Also they continue to recruit new members-taking from the recognized fraternities potential new member pool.
You'd think that from a Risk Management standpoint TKE IHQ would want the chapter dissolved to avoid future problems (lawsuits).

Re: TKE at UD
 

From what I know chapters not recoginzed by the school are watched more carefully than those that are recognized. I would think they would be more careful being watched by IHQ than the school because IHQ can pull the charter the school can't.

what's up with all the hate on TKE? what did they ever do to anybody?

I guess they don't like that TKE IHQ will stick by our chapters even when others think certain ones should be closed. Plus they probably feel the chapters not recognized by campus have an unfair advanatge because they don't have to follow the school rules other do. Oh well, all the hatin just makes me love TKE more.

Our TKEs also had their university recognition taken away, and their nationals allow them to continue to operate. They're some cool guys, and from what I hear, they're bigger than the biggest IFC house.

Many thought that all they did was party, but they did pull together a great community service event as well as raised thousands for their charity.

However, they have started fights with IFC on a couple of occasions, and two of their new members were killed last year after a brother retreat in the desert (their car accidently crashed on the way home). The accident had nothing to do with the brothers themselves, but the backlash was that if they weren't operating with no rules and regulations set by the school, this might not have happened.

Overall, TKE is cool, they have our backs when we get into shit too, and most of them are cool guys.

Don't expect them to rejoin IFC anytime soon. If they did, they'd have to expell or at least give alum status to about 110 guys, and start over from scratch.

Not dogging on TKE as a whole.. but seriously with as many chapters as they have are they supposed to babysit these guys? It's an interesting way of dealing with things that they have. 10 years from now I see two possible paths... #1 ya'll will be the largest NIC type group around bar-none OR you'll be in some financial hurt due to lawsuits.

Only time will be the judge..

Your spelling is a little "scarey" too ;)

....and ktsnake, you're acting like SN doesn't protect its chapters. I picked up a nice read about the underground SN chapter at U of Oregon when I was at MGCA. Pretty interesting reading material. Nice how the Sigma Nu HQ's swept that incident (Feb. 1, 2003) under the rug. Get off your high horse man, you won't win any popularity contests with an attitude like yours.

holy shit, how can you say this?...it's obvious the city (in conjunction with the university) is taking any means to get rid of greek life...they're stretching the laws, 3 days to find somewhere else to live? How is that justified?

Not trying to win a popularity contest (obviously).

I'm not denying that my own organization has never done anything wrong. I know of at least one chapter that's not recognized by the school that is still recognized by HQ (I think FSU is like that or was). They take it on a case by case basis. HOWEVER, I know that if the school pulled our recognition that we'd very very likely lose our charter.

How could we lose the school's recognition? By being *convicted* of:

Hazing, maintaining extremely low GPA's, serving alcohol to minors etc...

All of it in my opinion is considered "high risk behavior".

Now if you want to PM me, I'll tell you why the TKE chapter here is no longer recongized. For what they've done (and continue to do) they are pretty much just asking for something serious to happen.

An example of another organization's handling something different from the way TKE deals with chapters: there was a KS chapter that was convicted of hazing, some kid got seriously injured (alcohol was involved). They didn't close the chapter, BUT they said they were going to require the house to go dry and raise their insurance premiums. The chapter CHOSE to close.

Sounds like they were there for the wrong reasons.

I'm not against standards that make sure your members are there for the right reasons.

It upsets me because the actions of any GLO reflect on all of the rest. Joe Student doesn't know Sigma Nu from Kappa Sigma to TKE ("it's all Greek to them:D "). So when you know one organization is a liability and really has nothing to worry about from continuing their behavior.. well it's not good for anyone.

Lawsuits happen just as much to eveyone even if recogonized by the school. I don't see how being recognized by the school would affect the number of lawsuits. It's not like the school tries to protect the fraternties , they just try to get rid of them.

Campus recognition doesn't affect whether or not you get sued, but it can affect whether or not you win.

If the campus does not recognize the chapter because they engage in dangerous behavior, the national organization is rolling the dice by keeping them open.

Say someone gets hurt. The parent's sue the GLO. A GLO's best defense is "we didn't know it was going on...we did our best to ensure that it didn't happen...etc." If the campus doesn't recognize the group, then it's pretty obvious to the jury that somebody knew what was going on in the group.

The GLO's defense is shot. Hence, lots of scary lawsuits that the GLO will lose.

Getting sued is expensive. Getting sued and losing could break you.

That might make sense except for the fact that all the members of the fraternity in question are in good standing with the university.

TKE pulls charters all the time. I read somewhere it is about 10 a year. I respect the fact that they stand behind chapters unlike some nationals. Universities are always trying to get rid of fraternities and sometime the reasons are bullshit. A few years ago, Stevens Tech( NJ) asked SPE to pull a chapter's charter because of a noise violation. That's a joke.

What's your point?

When a chapter loses campus recognition, in my experience that has little bearing on the individual member's standing with the institution.

Do you have an example of an instance where an institution revoked campus recognition and then kicked every member of the fraternity out of school?

Someone help me out here...

Question:

Are they standing behind a group of men who make values-based decisions, contribute in a significant way to the campus environment and maintain high organizational standards...

or are they hiding behind "freedom of association" as a means of keeping a source of revenue open?

Let me sum up what I've been saying...

Inter/National orgs have to change the way they look at chapters as the time goes by. Each chapter is seen as an investment. Just like with any investment there are good ones and bad ones -- some degree of risk is always involved.

Risk means lawsuits... What is the risk vs. the money coming in to pay the insurance premiums? Insurance is probably (no hard figures to back this up but I'd gather as much) the #1 expense of inter/national fraternities.

All I said is that I think TKE is taking a different approach to this problem. They are choosing to ignore the risk that has been identified by others from the outside of these chapters looking in -- they identify the risk by pulling their support for the existance of the organization on their campus. TKE has decided that it is better to try to maintain the financial/manpower input from organizations that others have deemed to be 'at risk'.

I see two possible outcomes if this behavior continues unchanged:

#1. They grow and prosper.
#2. They are sued or their premiums raise high enough to put them out of existance because they allow chapters that are known to be high-risk to continue to operate unabated.

Regardless of what you think only time will be the judge of whether this strategy works or not. If it works, I'd hope to see more inter/national groups follow suit (and they'd be smart to). I think that in these new times though everyone else is just playing it safe.

This is very true for us right now. Our national HQ is being sued for a pledge death at U of MD. The charter was removed after an investigation. If the insurance company can settle out of court then we don't have to worry about going under. But, if it goes to trial and they rule against HQ it could break us.

KT. How come all the Sigma Nu chapters that were accused of hazing the past couple of months were innocent until proven guilty but this chapter is guilty until proven innocent? I think you have a double standard.

http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...threadid=30993

http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...threadid=30187

http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...threadid=30184

http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...threadid=32372

PS. Isn't Sigma Nu one of the other underground fraternities at UD?

Madmax, the point that KTSnake has been trying to make is that the TKE chapter was found guilty of these violations.

So what.

The court system and the campus judicial system already levied the punishment. The chapter paid its debt to society, which probably amounted to nothing more than a small fine. Then the chapter moved forward and continued to prosper. Now, several years later, the school with the help of the town wants to come up with additional punishment. That is bull#%#&.

Why should they lose their house? That has nothing to do with the violations.

Why should they lose their charter?

The house, is a zoning code. Say you and your buddies, just some friends from school, not brothers, wanted to rent property that is zoned as a fraternity/sorority house. The city is going to classify a group by their recognition on campus. No recognition means you can't rent it b/c it will not be used for what it is zoned for. Same thing as if I wanted to open say a convience store in my house. No haouse anymore, just a convience store. The house is zoned as residential, I wouldn't be able to open the store unless I got the property re-zoned. Also it states in the article that they sign leases, so yes it is their house by lease. But, as I stated before, I'm sure DE has the same type of law as PA and that is a chpater can not own property.

Why should they lose their charter? You are found in violation of that many policies and you can't tell me that violating that many policies means your upholding the ideals that the fraternity was founded on.

How is the house not being used as a fraternity?
The house is being used in the exact same matter as it was 30 years ago.
It is not like they are using the house as a conveniece store.

What he's saying is that the house is zoned to be used as a fraternity house.

If UD indicates that the fraternity is no longer technically a fraternity, then the house is no longer a fraternity house.

It turns into a rental property, just like an apartment. If it's not zoned to be a rental property, they have a problem.

Apparently, this house is not zoned as a rental property. Therefore, they can't rent out the rooms.

The school does not recognize them as a fraternity, so neither does the city. It's all about how the city sees them. This chapter is going to be treated as an underground by the university so the city probably sees them an undergrad.

Don't know about if they're 'underground' usually HQ yanks the charter of an organization that's no longer recognized by the school. There are exceptions though.

And in all of the cases I was saying that in light of recent allegations, things that had *just* come up. In the case that we're talking about here they have been found guilty and the administration has yanked their membership. I don't actually know how any of those 4 cases you cited ended up panning out... If in fact they did what they were accused of, yes, even Sigma Nu's can get what's coming to them.

PSK

Weren't most older GLOs actually started as secret off-campus organizations that had no formal ties to the university? Using your analogy are those fraternities not real since they didn't have university recognition? What about chapters in Canada where some schools do not recongize Greek life or chapters at Harvard, Alfred, UC Santa Clara?


If the initial fraternities on a campus existed before the IFC and those fraternities started the IFC then why would they need IFC recognition to be a real fraternity?






As far as this relates to TKE at UD:

1. The town does recognize TKE as a fraternity. The town let TKE move into the house and they lived there the whole year. Then with 2 weeks left in the semester the town makes up a new law and tries to evict them. That is bullshit.

2. The town has a noise ordinance that only applies to fraternities. If a fraternity has more than 2 noise violations then they can be evicted. The town considered TKE a real fraternity when they enforcing the ordinance.


I think TKE will win their lawsuit but even if they don't they will just move into a different house and continue to operate.


PSK. If a student graduates, would they have to be evicted from a student rental? Should a chapter be evicted if they have a non member live in the house like a cook, maid or a girlfriend?

Zoning isn't about who uses a property, it is about how a property is being used.

I believe I have heard the courts are letting them stay in the house until the lawsuit agaisnt the city is decided.

This has turned into a pretty heated thread and I have not read through all of it so I wont comment on this situation at UD.

I do not know whether the TKE HQ "pulls charters all the time", I do not work for their HQ (like a lot of people posting in this thread) and I am not privelegded to such inside information (like a lot of people posting in this thread).

But I do know that the Indiana University chapter just lost its charter a few weeks ago.

So....yes, they do close chapters (for those who wanted to know when the last time was that they heard of a chapter closing).

In defense of Tau Kappa Epsilon...they do have A LOT of chapters (more then anyone else). Maybe it seems like they pull a lot becuase they have so many.

If we took into account the "closing 10 chapters a year" information, that would still only be like 3-4% of their national roster.

I'm sure a lot of organizations close 4-5 chapters a year. For many groups (outside of the "big 6" of course), that would be roughly the same percentage.