Even by the worst standards of rowdy college apartment life, the mess and the stench left in the Gables C apartment building on Homecoming weekend was remarkable.
Unsuspecting residents who called for the elevator three Saturdays ago found its floor and walls covered in vomit. But there was more. Someone — no one has come forward — smeared human feces on the wall.
While university officials try to curtail underage drinking, they pay comparatively little attention to the messes that often come with it, according to the housekeepers who are regularly stuck with mopping vomit. Residents are collectively billed for the cleanup.
The Gables elevator mess of Oct. 17 underscores what many describe as an unacceptable level of apathy on the part of students and housing officials. After repeated attempts for comment, Gables Apartment Manager Nate Talbot refused to discuss the matter or say whether it was investigated beyond calling custodians to clean it up.
Donald Ross, a Gables housing service maintenance worker, said cleaning unclaimed vomit is a regular part of his job and that some students show a patent lack of respect for their buildings and the people who clean them.
“I’m totally disgusted,” Ross said. “They see how many times they can spit on walls or how high they can leave a footprint on the wall. To me it's like, 'Come on! You're all college students. You should have more responsibility than that.'”
Brent Finethy, a Gables Housing Service maintenance worker, was the one who disinfected the C tower elevator on Monday morning.
“We see a mess like this about one out of every four weekends,” said Finethy. “You know, people just get drunk and throw up and make a mess,” he said.
While vomit is a common sight on weekends, human feces’ is another story.
According to UNH Professor of Sociology Val Hurst, alcohol may not be to blame for this disgusting episode. She said that drunk people lose some inhibitions, but do not typically behave like animals.
“This may be the act of a very immature individual having serious difficulties dealing with the stresses of college life,” Hurst said.
The scene — which was brought to the attention of a maintenance worker that night —required an on-call housekeeper to come in and take a look at it.
The way the system works, housekeeping services run only from Monday through Friday, so if a mess is made during the weekend, it stays there until Monday. The only exception to this is if the mess is health concerning, which includes vomit, broken glass, blood, and feces. In these cases, someone is called to the scene immediately.
"Once the call goes to dispatch, the pager is tripped and the housekeeper on call has an hour to respond," said UNH Housekeeping Manager, Gene Gargano.
According to some C Tower residents, however, even with the cleaning touch-ups made by the on-call housekeeper Saturday night, the elevator was still too gross for use.
"My grandparents came to visit on Sunday morning and could not even see my apartment because the elevator was disgusting and they couldn't walk up the stairs," said C Tower resident Alex Brix.
In addition to the inconvenience, C Tower residents are being charged for the soiled elevator. Students are billed by floor or building when there is an incident such as this, according to Gargano.
“If the [specific] student or students are caught, they will be billed directly,” he said.
Gargano said that on weekends, callbacks cost anywhere from $60 to $200, depending on the mess.
Though there is no progress or plan in order to catch this culprit, a small yellow sign now hangs on some doors featuring a picture of a person throwing up and sporting, “$100 Fine” in big black letters.
While littering and other small messes are never going to stop occurring around this campus, some things can be prevented.
“Spilling a soda is accidental, spitting and other bodily waste left behind is appalling,” said Gargano, who worked as a housekeeper himself for fourteen years.
He said that he feels badly for his staff that is left to clean up after careless college students.
“It’s disgusting,” Gargano said. “It’s not accepted, and in almost every case it’s unavoidable.”
Anonymous student stinks up Gables C-Tower with feces
Published: Thursday, November 5, 2009
Updated: Friday, November 6, 2009 01:11
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