Will your campus be re-opening in the fall? What will enrollment be like? Will the University or CDC have stringent cleaning requirements? How will the economic downturn impact interest of freshman in recruitment? Will upperclassman have the discretionary income for fraternity dues?
These are just some of things I am sure you have been pondering these past months. In a few weeks, we will hold another town hall to discuss many of these issues with you. In the meantime, if you haven’t formalized alternative plans, I want to encourage you to go from “pondering” to “pre-planning."
We are are starting to see some universities announce fall plans. Some have been emphatic that students will return to campus in the fall (University of Alabama, University of North Carolina, etc.), and others (like the California State University system) have announced that they will be doing online learning again in the fall. I am sure that many more announcements will follow in the coming weeks. While it would be helpful to know the status of your campus, we are suggesting that you start your pre-planning process now.
What are some of examples of pre-planning we recommend?
Membership Level Scenarios:
First, we suggest that you roughly plan three budget scenarios: best case, worst-case and a middle scenario. We do not have a specific recommendation for you on what numbers to use, because that will vary by chapter (including the trend lines of prior growth and strength of the chapter). The house corporation should be working closely with the BCA/PL to best predict if any significant number of members will not return in the fall as well.
In a general sense, a best-case scenario might be 90% of membership levels are maintained, a worst-case scenario might be membership levels dropping 40-50%, and your middle scenario might be something in between. If you work your budget numbers for all three of these scenarios, there is a good chance you will not be caught off guard this fall.
House Operations:
The next next level of pre-planning deals with operational aspects of the house. Of course, these will be impacted by how your membership numbers play out.
Kitchen Operations - The level of planning you will need in this area depends on whether you are directly hiring a chef or using a food service company. If you are directly hiring a chef, you are going to need to do more work to understand what the food industry requirements are. It is our experience that the main Greek food service companies are very much on top of the evolving situation. For this reason, if you are directly hiring a chef, this might be an excellent time to at least consider using a food service company. Our preferred vendor, Upper Crust, is often able to retain current chefs and provide them with benefits! And their experience and resources would be ideal for many house corporations now. What are some of the potential new kitchen changes? Switching to individually served meals, required use of to-go containers, new kitchen sanitation requirements and labor and supply costs that might be incurred with some of these changes.
Cleaning - Cleaning and disinfecting recommendations and requirements are evolving, making this challenging to prepare. We think it is safe to assume that there will be some level of “frequent, rigorous” cleaning/sanitizing expected. House corporations should be thinking about what process they have in place currently and if that system could be executed more frequently - perhaps at a higher quality. Make sure you have a process in place to guarantee the recommended cleaning and sanitizing is completed as expected.
Requests for Refunds - If students are unable to return to school, or if campuses are forced to close again mid-semester, do you have a process or deadline ready for refund requests?
Communications with the Chapter and Graduate Brothers - Keeping undergraduates informed about your plans and ability to re-open will build confidence for these men. Keeping graduates informed is another key part of your role as a house corporation. It keeps them informed and more supportive of the HC’s situation.
General Operations - In what ways would changing membership numbers impact general operations, like: day-to-day maintenance operations of the house/yard maintenance, preventative maintenance and safety systems?
Planned Maintenance & Repairs - Every house has a list of necessary repairs. While the pandemic has been a severe disruption, we encourage our house corporations to keep up with the basic repairs and maintenance as much as possible so returning brothers have the best experience possible when they move back in.
We want to ensure that 1848 Housing is ready to provide support and advice if you need it. We can also help connect you to brothers involved with other house corporations so that you can network and learn from your peers.
Fraternally,
Steve Bocher President, 1848 Properties Inc.
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