Some of the UC Santa Barbara Students who are staying in hotels off-campus for the fall quarter will have the opportunity to move into on-campus accommodation for the winter quarter, according to UCSB spokeswoman Andrea Estrada.

For students who are not offered accommodation on campus and cannot find any alternative forms of living, the university extends hotel accommodation contracts until the winter quarter, which will be launched for the first time on a. were announced November 16th meeting of the town hall.

There were more than 360 UCSB students originally housed in 10 hotels in the Goleta area as a result of The unprecedented real estate crisis at UCSBwhich resulted in many students desperately looking for an apartment in Isla Vista and putting themselves on university housing waiting lists.

At the town hall meeting, university administrations announced that 60 students had moved to hotels on campus and 40 to apartments in the community, but UCSB was negotiating ongoing agreements with local hotels based on demand from the 280 remaining hotel students.

“We’ll probably really have these hotels for the rest of the year,” said Mario Muñoz, assistant director of University & Community Housing Services and Resident Placement & Assignment Services, at the time.

The university pays hotels about $ 175 per person per night and students pay about $ 26, according to Muñoz, who said negotiations with hotels are expected to be completed early next week.

“It wasn’t optimal living, and we still don’t believe it is optimal living. It is something that we need in this current process. We don’t want to repeat that, ”said Muñoz, answering questions from students about living conditions in the hotels.

the Daily Nexus has reported several students describe the water in their hotel rooms as discolored and bad tasting, and Isla Vistas locals Food instead of bombs Chapter provides hotel students with access to fresh food they might not otherwise get.

For the coming winter quarter, the university’s goal is to move as many students as possible into campus apartments.

“Since enrollments are typically lower for the winter quarter, we expect a large number of campus accommodation that are currently being offered to students in hotels to open up,” said Estrada. “Residential & Community Living and Community Housing Office staff continue to support students who live in hotels, offer campus housing and / or help them find permanent housing in the community.”

Last Friday, Estrada said the number of students living in hotels “changes daily,” and the university is unable to provide specific figures on how many students have accepted on-campus residential contracts.

Sarah Hamidi, a fifth year anthropology student who lived at the Ramada Inn for the fall quarter, made her disappointing hotel experience public. Now she was finally offered accommodation on campus.

“I waited until the end of November and still hadn’t heard of any hotel expansion or accommodation on campus, and they told me to just stick with it,” Hamidi said.

The UCSB originally only offered hotel accommodation to the students for the autumn quarter. Although the university publicly announced its intention to renew hotel rental contracts at the meeting in mid-November, Hamidi said she was only informed when she received an email from the university on December 2 with an on-campus rental contract.

“I got an email about the apartment contract and they told me that this would be the only offer they would make,” she said, noting that she hadn’t heard of the specific apartments in which she could be placed.

Hamidi said she accepted the offer because she sees it as a huge improvement in her current life situation, where she has to buy or have all of her food and water delivered and she drives to campus every day. Although she is grateful that she had a place to stay last quarter, she is disaffected with the university.

“Ultimately, after everything I’ve been through, and especially because of the housing crisis, I am really disappointed with the school and have lost a lot of respect for the school,” said Hamidi.

She also called on UCSB Chancellor Henry Yang to resign.

“I wish more adults would listen and understand what our struggles are and just be a little more empathetic,” she said.

– Holly Rusch is a Noozhawk Contributing author and university editor for the UCSB Daily Nexus.