After nearly two years of meetings and debates, Boston College’s $1.6 billion Institutional Master Plan, which will take ten years to complete, was approved by the city council on May 8, 2009.

The goals of the expansion include to “commit Boston College to becoming the leader in liberal arts education among American universities” and to “become the world’s leading Catholic university and theological center,” according to the website for the Institutional Master Plan.

Although these changes will unquestionably be transformative for the University’s reputation, residents in the communities around Boston College have expressed doubts and dissatisfaction about the construction. One of the major concerns BC’s Brighton neighbors have raised is the dangerous impact the construction will have on aqueducts underneath the campus that supply water to nearby towns.

Moreover, as a May 2009 article on Boston.com explained, “Members of Brighton Neighbors United, a group that focuses on preserving green space and limiting institutional expansion, came out in force and vocally opposed BC’s plans, arguing that the university had steam-rolled its proposal through the process.”

The Boston College administration has responded to such attacks with a statement on the Institutional Master Plan website, which emphasizes the school’s commitment “to engaging the community in an open dialogue and inclusive process that gathers input from interested stakeholders in the neighborhoods surrounding our campus. The University’s goal is to establish ongoing communication with the community and identify areas where we can agree on resolutions to shared issues.”

The site also includes a table that delineates an “up-to-date list of the community outreach efforts undertaken by Boston College since 2004.”
The most important question we, as students and members of the Boston College community, must ask ourselves is how the new “town and gown” tension will impact our safety, not only on campus but also in the surrounding neighborhoods.

Currently, BC has an A in safety in The College Prowler, a guide that outlines various and sundry facts about different colleges for prospective students. Will the construction change this ranking?

The attack of a female student on campus during the early morning hours of May 5, 2009 by an unidentified older male indicates that the boundaries between campus and community are unquestionably blurred. In January, furthermore, a male student was involved in an altercation with locals that ended with the student being hospitalized for stab wounds.

Although these events are not necessarily related to the Master Plan, students and staff alike have shown concern for the changing nature of safety on campus.  Last week, the Boston College Police Department published a special edition of Callbox, a newsletter on neighborhood policing.  The issue includes a section on neighborhood safety that provides students with key tips on how to develop habits and common sense to avoid any problems while traveling around the city.

After the attack on campus in May, students began the “Swipe for Safety” campaign, which was aimed at changing the dorms a student can unlock with an access card.  Their petition, as posted on the website “Students Take Action” included the following: “It is our opinion that students should at least have access to other dorms near their own after midnight, and access at all hours to dorms that house other members of their class. We would also like to petition for BC to consider a situation where a student is attacked somewhere other than around their building; in such a situation, the student is locked out of dorms which could provide a safe haven for the attacked.” The group’s goal of 1000 supporters had not been reached by press time.

Tension between a university and its surrounding community is nothing new.  In fact, Yale University has experienced conflicts—and even violent riots—with the residents of New Haven, Connecticut since 1806.  The Princeton Review even publishes a list entitled “Town and Gown Relations Strained,” a list of the colleges with the greatest problems with locals.

This year, Trinity College was ranked first.  Boston College was not ranked, but that does not mean we should discount community strain as having an impact on safety.

Other colleges that have undergone large development plans have witnessed the dangerous consequences that can occur when the neighbors do not agree with the project. For example, in 1992, Rowan University, in New Jersey, formerly known as Glassboro State, received a $100 million gift from Henry and Betty Rowan.  At the time, this was the largest donation to a public college in history, and for this reason, the school was renamed to honor these two benefactors.

On October 27, 2007, the University’s homecoming weekend, student Donald Farrell, 19, was attacked and killed by locals on campus at a location that was visible from a major intersection. The town itself is notorious for resenting the growing status of Rowan University, which is ranked in US News & World Report for its engineering program and is also well known for its education school.

At Boston College, we have not—and hopefully never will—experience the kind of tragedy that took place at Rowan, especially since, despite efforts from America’s Most Wanted, Farrell’s killers have never been caught.  At the same time, however, we must be mindful of the changing nature not only of our campus but also of our relationship with the local community. We must recognize that our success comes at a cost. We must work to make sure that cost is strictly the $1.6 billion allotted for the expansion plan and not our safety or our lives.

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