Fraternity rowdiness reduced; neighbors relieved
By Brandon Griggs
The Salt Lake Tribune
A long-simmering feud between partying students and the more placid residents of the University of Utah's Greek Row appears to have cooled.
After two decades of tension over rowdy fraternity and sorority bashes, the rival neighborhood groups are celebrating détente. Fraternity and sorority leaders say they are educating their members about civic responsibility. And noise complaints from their middle-aged neighbors have plummeted.
The two groups even cozied up to one another at a Saturday news conference called by Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson, who residents say deserves credit for addressing the problem. Anderson may be in a unique position to help mediate the dispute: The 1973 University of Utah graduate lived on Greek Row himself as a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity.
"I well remember the conflicts that arose [when I was a student] because I was probably helping to create them," said Anderson on the steps of the Sigma Phi Epsilon frat house. "We don't expect there will always be peace and quiet in this neighborhood. You get young people together in a college setting . . . and there will be issues. But it's vastly improved."
In the city's affluent Federal Heights neighborhood, where retired professors live next door to fraternity houses, complaints about noise, litter and drunkenness have been an annual occurrence. In response, city officials hired professional arbitrators two years ago to mediate a series of meetings between fraternity members and neighbors. Fraternities provided contact names and numbers to neighbors whose first recourse in the past often was to call the police.
Student Shaun Cunningham, president of the university's Interfraternity Council, has met regularly with neighbors, police and city officials to discuss the issue. Cunningham sent letters to his Federal Heights neighbors before Rush Week last month, alerting them that Greek Row would be livelier than usual. Perhaps as a result, the week passed smoothly.
"We want to be neighborly," said Cunningham, noting his frat, Sigma Phi Epsilon, hires two police officers to monitor large parties. "It's not like 'Animal House' around here. Things are pretty structured."
Neighborhood resident Beverly Nelson, who has complained repeatedly in recent years about raucous Greek Row parties, agreed that the situation has improved.
"A lot has changed," she said. "Now we don't even hear them. And I don't clean up trash in my yard anymore."
Nelson attributes much of the change to the closure of the rambunctious Kappa Sigma frat, which lost its charter last year after serving alcohol to minors.
"Things are so much better," agreed resident Bob Sanders, who serves on a neighborhood relations committee. "After 20 years of acrimony, the arbitration process was like a breath of fresh air. I haven't heard a complaint from a neighbor in a year-and-a-half."
griggs@sltrib.com
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