Grays Harbor College administrators are trying to take steps to alleviate the housing woes felt by students.

“We have to really scramble each fall (to find adequate housing for incoming students),” said college President Dr. Jim Minkler. “About 10 percent of students are in what is considered unstable housing, meaning they are living month-to-month” with no guarantee of long-term housing solutions, said Minkler. “With our athletic program we also have to scramble and too many of them are living in substandard housing.”

Funds are the key

Minkler said funding is what will or won’t make housing on or near the campus a reality.

“We don’t have a budget for (student housing) and the Board of Technical Colleges doesn’t provide funding for housing,” he said. “So we’re going to have to reach out to partners in the community, people who want to help.”

The State Board for Community and Technical Colleges is a 9-person, governor-appointed group that, among other duties dealing with the state’s 34 technical and community colleges, is charged with prioritizing proposed projects at those colleges and sending that list of projects to the Legislature for budget consideration. Housing is not covered by the board.

Minkler said ideally a developer would come in and construct a housing complex, which could then be leased by the college and used for student housing.

“We would offer to manage the residence and have a residence hall adviser on site,” said Minkler. A possibility would include naming the building after the principal donor. But before anything can be built it will take a considerable donation or donations by alumni, community members and other sources.

Potential locations

A possible location for future housing is 23 acres of ground adjacent to the Bishop Center for the Performing Arts, baseball practice field and parking lot. The college had been leasing the property from the Department of Natural Resources for years at a rate of about a dollar per year. Recently, the land was transferred by the state and is now owned by the college. It is primarily wooded, with Alder Creek cutting through it, which the college uses for its fisheries and natural resources program.

The college has considered looking into the Heather Meadows apartments, just across Boone Street from the entrance to the college. The complex has 94 units, but is not currently listed for sale and “we don’t have any money” to buy it at this time, said Minkler.

Another potential for student housing could involve an adjacent piece of property situated between the Aberdeen Elks Lodge and the college’s child care center. Minkler said the current owners, the Druzianich family, have expressed interest in selling the property to the school.