Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said that “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Although the good doctor was most certainly not referring to Georgetown students right to live in high-priced community housing, the point still stands.
The West Cloisters Homeowner’s Association voted Wednesday on a measure to prohibit more than three unrelated individuals from living in a Cloisters residence. Although the association didn’t reach a final decision, it did pass the measure onto a special committee, which will decide the matter by June 25. If passed, students who want to live in the Cloisters, a private housing community north of campus, would be prohibited from doing so. And though only a small number of Georgetown students actually live in this high-end area, it is a shame that the homeowner’s association has decided to discriminate against students’ rights.
Jim Kinsella, the association’s president, maintains that the new measure was not created to keep students out of the community. Instead, he explains that it will be easier for families to obtain mortgages on houses surrounded by homeowner-occupied houses, not seasonal non-homeowner occupants.
But Kinsella’s claim raises two questions. First, housing in the Cloisters costs between $760,000 and $1.1 million. Families who want to purchase this type of expensive housing will most likely not have a problem obtaining a mortgage. If they do, they probably shouldn’t be attempting to buy a million-dollar house in the first place.
Second, if the primary reason for the measure is to ensure that seasonal non-homeowner residents live the community, why not simply do just that? The amendment also caps the permissible amount of leased properties at 25 percent, so prohibiting unrelated individuals from buying housing seems like an unnecessary measure which discriminates against a a group of people?namely, students.
This issue comes at a time when students’ rights to live in the Georgetown neighborhood are already being challenged. Even if this new measure will only affect students wealthy enough to live in the high-priced Cloisters, it is one more unnecessary, illogical measure targeted against students. And the special committee should strike it down.
