Though this letter is only from one person, it embodies the frustrations of several hundred disenfranchised college students who have found themselves in a seemingly hopeless situation. The situation I speak of is our lodging at several of Tallahassee’s hotels because our apartment complex, Campus Pointe, located at 3000 S. Adams street, is incomplete and thus we are having to be accommodated through an extended hotel stay that to date, is said to be for at least one month. Our frustrations were not because of the hotel stay, but because of the endless promises the complex or construction company has made to us in an effort to abate us. Prior to our August 21 arrival, were we assured that talks of compensating through a concessions stipend for food would be provided in addition monies being taken off if October’s rent. I can honestly say that though we all have been moved into a hotel, we have not been compensated in any shape or form. Myself and about two hundred and forty nine (249) other students have been left to foot the daily food bills of lunch and dinner. Some sort of voucher was supposed to be supplied to us for breakfast at the restaurant located in the hotel yet no voucher has been received. Perhaps most upsetting besides the food situation is how the students who do not have cars have been having to navigate about town via Taltran to try and arrive at class, or at work on time. My roommate on Monday, spent five hours on three different buses trying to get back to the hotel. Though the majority of students were fully prepared to be accommodated in a hotel for upwards of a month, footing our food bills and having to spend extra dollars on gas, laundry, and not having access to computers and the internet were not part of the inconveniences we were told we would have to experience.Campus Pointe is quietly telling students when asked, that they do have the option of opting out of their lease. Though this seems like a easy enough suggestion, in reality it is not. The added pressure of apartment hunting in addition to our current frustrations, classes and work is seemingly unthinkable at this point.The majority of students have no doubt that when Campus Pointe opens, it will be a wonderful place to stay, however the struggles we are having to go through now make that affirmation seem too far off in the future to even fathom right now. All the other students and I ask is that Campus Pointe or the construction company makes good on the promises we were first told of when we were alerted to our current predicament.
Rachel YoungFAMU Graduate Student(850) 284-6185