Christian Groups Inhabit Houses at Colorado and Colorado State...

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Subject: CU and CSU: Image makeover on fraternity row after last year's alcohol related deaths

The Denver Post
August 26, 2005

Image makeover on frat row After alcohol-related deaths at CU and CSU
fraternity houses last year, prayer services are replacing parties

By Jennifer Brown
Denver Post Staff Writer


Fort Collins - The room where Samantha Spady died is calming, with
moss-green carpet, ferns around beige couches and six stone crosses on the
wall.

This is the prayer room, the most peaceful spot in the former Sigma Pi
fraternity house - a red-brick mansion known a year ago as the place for
raging parties and where the Colorado State University sophomore died of
alcohol poisoning.

Two dozen Christian youths moved into the house, now known as The
Lighthouse, this month. The Sigma Pi letters are gone, the bar has been
ripped out of the basement, and new oak covers the floors.

It seemed obvious the room where Spady died wouldn't become just another
bedroom.

"We are in this house because a year ago something horrible happened," said
house director Sarah Laribee. "We never wanted to forget that. It's really
a painful message that death is the enemy and Christ is our salvation."

Spady died Sept. 5 after drinking vanilla vodka with friends, who brought
her to the second-floor room to sleep it off. A week and a half later at
the University of Colorado, freshman Lynn "Gordie" Bailey died of alcohol
poisoning at the Chi Psi fraternity house after chugging whiskey and wine
around a mountain campfire.

The national organizations of both fraternities pulled their charters
because of the deaths.

In Boulder, the former fraternity house isn't what it used to be, either.

Two dozen women, most of them members of a Christian sorority or campus
ministry, moved into the white mansion supported by eight regal pillars in
time for the start of fall classes Monday. The sisters of Alpha Delta Chi
have a strict code: No drinking until 21. No smoking. No premarital sex.
Even the girls who aren't sorority sisters pledged to respect those rules
in the house's common areas.

"There will be partying, yes, but not the stereotypical kind," said Sarah
Meyer, a resident who is not a member of Alpha Delta Chi. "Let's get some
good vibes into the house. We would love to have it be known as a place of
joy."

The sorority sisters were drawn to the house on The Hill, just across the
street from campus, because it would bring a Christian influence to Greek
row. An organization of Chi Psi alumni owns the house, which is managed by
a leasing company.

"There's so much, like, bad energy directed toward this house because of
what happened," said Tonya Delmez, an Alpha Delta Chi member. "We want to
bring up its image."

The women met one night this week to scrub the house clean and rid it of
the grime the fraternity left behind. Still, that fraternity feel might
never leave.

A pool table sits in the front common room near leather couches and a big-
screen television. The library is dark and a bit dingy, and the black-and-
white-tiled kitchen holds a giant steel refrigerator and industrial stove
big enough to cook for a house of men.

"We're still moving in, trying to make it our own," Tiffany Williams said.
"The frat boys kind of tore it up."

In Fort Collins, fresh paint and new furniture transformed the Sigma Pi
house. Timberline Church, which leases the house from owner Lambda Chi
fraternity, sank money into it on faith, Laribee said.

Spady's parents have no financial ties to The Lighthouse but supported the
project and toured the house during its final renovations, Laribee said.

Students who live there pay $460 per month and must sign a code of conduct.
Alcohol is forbidden, even away from the house. Residents can't have
overnight guests of the opposite sex and aren't allowed to date one another.

Jared Petsche, 19, transferred from the University of Northern Colorado
just to live at The Lighthouse.

"It's a God thing," he explained. "It's just so incredibly sad what
happened here. That's the best part of this house now - we're going to be
working to combat that."

Rachel Westing, 22, partied at the Sigma Pi house during her first years of
college. The CSU senior said she gave up drinking when she gave her life to
Christ, and when she heard Timberline Church was transforming the house she
knew she wanted to live there.

"I wanted to be a part of something where people didn't feel judged for
where they're at in their life," she said.

Copyright 2005 The Denver Post