Some residents of Anderson and Centennial halls who are frustrated by waiting in long lines to receive packages from the mailroom have tried to remedy the situation by submitting a petition.
The petition was signed by 59 students and submitted to Housing and Dining Programs Jan. 25 to protest the package lines.
Anderson and Centennial halls share a mailroom and are the most highly populated residence halls. The volume of packages that flow into the two halls is greater than that of any other building, according to Prakash Karnani, assistant director of operations for Housing and Dining.
A letter submitted with the petition described the wait times as unfair to the students receiving the packages and the staff members distributing them.
The package hours, typically between 9 and 11 p.m. on weeknights, are inconvenient, said Juliana Fritz, a sophomore in the College of Arts and Sciences.
"It's inconvenient because maybe you're not here during package hours, and maybe you need that book," she said.
There had been one instance where the line was wrapped around the first floor of Anderson, according to Alex Manzanares, a sophomore in the Kogod School of Business. The line stretched from the package room and around the elevators to near the Residence Hall Association office, resulting in a wait time of over an hour.
"This situation is embarrassing and unacceptable," the petition letter said.
Students brought homework and laptops to pass the time, Manzanares said.
Manzanares said he signed the petition.
While waiting for his packages, Manzanares said he created the Facebook group "Stop Anderson Hall Package lines!" The group had 93 members at press time.
However, these frustrations are not the fault of the desk receptionists or resident assistants, Manzanares said.
"We're asking for better working conditions for [the DRs and RAs], too," he said.
There was a backlog in the mailroom due to the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday Jan. 21, which contributed to the influx of students looking for packages the next day, Karnani said. Students having books shipped to school also bring extra traffic to the package system during the first few weeks of a semester, he said.
"We try to address that by double-staffing our mailrooms and even extending hours," he said.
The petition suggests treating Anderson Hall and Centennial Hall as two separate entities. Housing and Dining has considered this idea and is currently working on ways to fix this as part of an upcoming renovation of the halls within the next few years, Karnani said.
Students such as Fritz have called for the same 24-hour package times that are available in the other residence halls. This, however, is impossible for Anderson and Centennial, he said.
Higher traffic into the Anderson lobby and the design of the mailroom make it different from all of the other halls, Karnani said. The mailroom is too difficult to access quickly from the Anderson front desk, and the volume of packages would take too long for one desk receptionist to look through. Not having someone to keep watch on the front doors could become a security issue, he said.
"We can't distribute mail at the sacrifice of security," Karnani said.
However, the mailroom will be redesigned in the future with the proposed renovations to Anderson Hall. Until then, a plan will be developed to better cope with these peak times for packages, Karnani said. This plan will most likely mean double-staffing and lengthening package hours at times when there is a great demand, he said.
