HUDS Nixes Extra Hours

Harvard University Dining Services (HUDS) cannot afford to extend dining hall hours in the next academic year, according to information that HUDS directors presented yesterday to the Committee on House Life (CHL)—the group that has been advocating for an extension since last April.

The estimated costs of extending by one hour the entire meal service, grill service only, or salad, pasta, and deli bar service only, all exceeded the HUDS 2006-2007 budget, according to HUDS Director for Finance, Information Systems, and Procurement Raymond R. Cross. It would cost $202 per student per year to keep all of the dining halls open for an extra hour four nights per week, assuming that dinner attendance increases by three percent as a result of the later hours.

Cross also provided the estimated costs of hour-long extensions of the entire meal service or limited services to Annenberg and one house per “neighborhood,” as well as of shifting dining hours an hour earlier at these locations. Implementing this plan would increase the meal plan cost by $123 if dinner attendance went up by three percent.

The cost of each of these extended service possibilities is too expensive for HUDS’ $27.7-million annual budget, according to HUDS officials. HUDS expects a budget deficit for the coming academic year, due to the expense of renegotiating its labor contracts and the rising cost of food and utilities.

“HUDS is far more complicated than it appears when you are a student swiping in and out of the dining hall,” CHL member Tracy E. Nowski ’07 said.

Chair of the Undergraduate Council (UC) Student Affairs Committee Ryan A. Petersen ’08 attributed much of the extra costs of dining hour extensions to the extra meals that would be eaten.

The only way to cover such costs without removing funding from another area of the College would be to increase the board cost for undergraduates.

“College is already so expensive—nobody wants to pay a steep increase in the term bill over one year,” said Aaron D. Chadbourne ’06, a former member of the HUDS Student Advisory Committee.

Currently, 46 percent of the money from student meal plans goes to wages and benefit costs and 30 percent is spent on food. Other expenses such as supplies, utilities, laundry, and garbage removal make up the remaining 24 percent, Cross told The Crimson this fall.

Despite the financial analysis, however, the undergraduates, deans and house masters who comprise the CHL reaffirmed yesterday their long-term commitment to make Harvard dining more accessible to students.

“We’re all tremendously frustrated,” said Nowski. “But we’re now trying to explore much more creative options.”

Adams House Master Sean Palfrey suggested that CHL seek the assistance of Harvard Business School students who could use their expertise to find lower-cost ways to extend dining hall hours.

Many attendees of the meeting were especially concerned about finding a short-term solution for students for whom extra-curricular commitments cause them to consistently miss dining hall hours.

No one at the meeting expressed opposition to the implementation of an on-line system for ordering bag dinners—a service that Executive Director of HUDS Ted A. Mayer had said, at the most recent meeting of the dining subcommittee, could be implemented “definitely by September.”

And an attendee’s suggestion yesterday that the meals be dropped off at the Athletic Facilities across the Charles River may be considered by HUDS.

The extension of dining hall hours has been CHL’s main initiative ever since last spring, when a UC survey of 270 students indicated that 90 percent of students miss dinner at least once a week and 87 percent of students would likely eat dinner in the dining halls after 7:15 p.m. if it was an option.

“In order for us to keep making progress on this issue, we all need to remember the importance of students’ needs,” said Petersen. According to Chadbourne, Petersen “has shepherded this whole process through.”

The other topic of discussion at yesterday’s meeting was the planning of the annual Freshman Advising Night, during which freshmen go to their newly assigned Houses for a brain break with concentration advisers.

CHL member Jessica L. Jones ’06 proposed that the brain break be changed to a dinner in order to draw more freshmen.

—Staff writer Nina L. Vizcarrondo can be reached at nvizcarr@fas.harvard.edu.