West Lafayette City Council addresses housing shortage, Purdue's impact

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. − Many hot topics were discussed at Monday night's West Lafayette City Council meeting, ranging from a call to action from the city to Purdue regarding student housing to the renaming of Mitch Daniels Boulevard.

Other issues included a vague grant towards public safety; the designation of an economic revitalization area; a new spay/neuter clinic for Hoosier animals and amended Historic Preservation Commission boundaries, just to name a few.

A call to action for Purdue

A resolution called for a "shared understanding concerning housing between Purdue University and the City of West Lafayette" was presented to the board by Council Member James Blanco. This "call to action" was an agenda item that multiple council members spoke vehemently about.

"Today the challenge we have, that has been a challenge for many years, but it's just kept on going like a crescendo," Blanco said. "That is housing and housing affordability, but also housing availability."

Blanco further stated that while the student housing vacancy rate has been low for years, now it is at zero.

"That reflects a crisis in terms of housing availability," Blanco said. "This resolution is basically a call to action on the part of the city and also to Purdue University to address this. We need more housing, especially with the number of students that are being admitted year over year which keeps on increasing."

Councilman Nick DeBoer further commented on this housing resolution.

"Obviously I support (the resolution)," DeBoer said. "It's been an issue for a really long time. I've been here the entire time watching the vacancy go from 2% to 1% to 0%. Now, will something happen overnight? No. But I think that two things could happen. One, the university could build more housing...The other thing is, we could allow more. The last time we built the towers on State Street, The HUB and The Rise, we felt as a community and local leaders that we're going to pause, see how this plays out before we build anything else. That was incorrect judgement on our parts."

Council Member Ted Hardesty, the Purdue student sitting on the council, gave his perspective of a student who has and is going through the housing shortages on campus firsthand.

"Part of the issue, too, is that, in a normal market, the biggest employer of this city would bring in people based on the availability (of housing)," Hardesty said. "Yet, my freshman year (and) my sophomore year, Purdue overshot how many (housing options) we had. And I know people personally who were in the basement of a dormitory in a cubicle."

Councilman David Sanders, also an associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Purdue, was also on board with this resolution, discussing how Purdue needs to acknowledge that the impacts that the university makes "go beyond the borders of the campus."

"This issue of the massive increase in the student population at Purdue, the whole purpose of it was to allow for the marketing technique of the tuition freeze," Sanders said. "It is a marketing technique because... people are paying more in tuition even if the tuition, the actual price of the tuition, hasn't changed. People are actually playing more than they did before the tuition freeze. And that has to do with, among other things, a decline in aid for attending Purdue University.

"...When you freeze tuition, per say, rather than increasing aid, you are mostly helping wealthier students. You are not, in fact, helping poorer students by that tuition freeze...Before the tuition freeze, at least half of the increase in tuition could be directly attributed to the increase in health insurance costs. So in order to fund it, what (Purdue) decided to do was massively increase the student population without consulting the faculty, without actually thinking about... what effect it would have on West Lafayette government and the West Lafayette community."

Sanders further stated that this resolution is "long over due," and that the "Purdue administration needs to understand that their actions have effects beyond the borders of the campus."

Members of the board were not the only ones who spoke on behalf of the housing crisis on Purdue's campus, as West Lafayette citizen Sandra Kelly spoke during a public comment session regarding the issue.

"Like many of the council members, I'm concerned about the increase in student numbers at Purdue and how it's affecting our community," Kelly said. "And tonight I would like to commend you for addressing this issue and briefly share some of my concerns. Purdue is an attractive and affordable university, and this year, Purdue has celebrated its highest enrollment ever with 50,884 students in attendance. Of this number, just over 15,000 students live on campus, which leaves the remaining 35,000 living off campus. Purdue is only housing three out of every 10 students.

"Though it's admirable that Purdue is keeping college costs down, it does so at the expense of our West Lafayette community. By not expending money on building new student residences, the local housing market becomes skewed and unaffordable for current residents and people who work here and would like to live near their jobs."

According to a Purdue Moves statement, in 2020, "41 percent of Purdue’s fall 2020 residential undergraduate students live on campus."

Public safety federal grant

City Controller Peter Gray briefly presented this agenda item to the board, describing a grant recently received by the West Lafayette Police Department for $152,797. It is not stated what specifically this grant funding will be used for in the resolution document.

"The police department was able to secure a federal grant for $152,797," Gray said. "And this appropriation allows us to spend that money this year."

During public comment, West Lafayette citizen Lissa Davis commented on the transparency of this grant, and expressed her desired for further detail on what the funding will be used for.

"What concerns me is that there isn't any further explanation of what public safety expenses that money will be used for," Davis said. "As defined by the 2019 Indiana code, public safety within the context of local income tax revenue can mean anything from emergency ambulance (services) to a juvenile detention facility. So some more transparency about what exactly the money is going to be used for would be appreciated."

The Journal & Courier spoke with West Lafayette Police Chief Troy Harris the day after the City Council meeting to learn more about where the funds would be used.

"I was kind of surprised that (the fund) wasn't actually explained and nor did our city council ask, I was prepared to talk about it," Harris said. "So what it is, it's for a public safety camera system. We already have one that runs all the way down State Street. It goes from Grant Street all the way down to Tapowingo. And it helps us address any vehicular or pedestrian problems and investigate any crimes that might happen.

"This grant will just build on that camera system. We are going to focus on the Tapowingo area on Northwestern Avenue as well."

Harris clarified that these are not the facial recognition camera that have been previously discussed at public meetings, but just regular traffic cameras.

An economic revitalization area pushback

The resolution calling for "the designation of an economic revitalization area and approving the deduction from assessed value of certain new real property improvements" caused a bit of a stir from Sanders as well.

Erin Easter, director of development for West Lafayette, explained what this resolution means in its entirety. This resolution, on behalf of Inari Agriculture, while it stands on its own, was essentially the first part of the immediate follow-up resolution that read nearly identically to this one, the only difference in the wording of the resolutions regarding the "real property" and the "personal property" in their descriptions.

"They are both resolutions because they do different things," Easter said. "Our first is a declaratory resolution which we passed at our last meeting which declared that we will consider this matter and after consideration...that we would confirm that tax abatement.

"...Inari Agriculture is an organization that came to the City of West Lafayette in 2018...and they were looking for a couple of great things: agricultural land where they could continue to built their greenhouses and continue their testing and the brilliant minds that we have at Purdue University and adjacent areas to help with that testing. The company subsequently created their greenhouses and hired 129 people who currently still work in this area today. The matter before you this evening is an expansion of that so they can continue their research and development efforts to provide seeds that are more resilient."

Easter further stated that the investment is a "$19.5 investment for research and development both (for) the personal property that will go within that building and also the real estate investment." The breakdown of that investment is $3.5 million in personal property and $16 million in real property.

According to the resolution memo, "(Inari) intends to construct a redevelopment or rehabilitation project consisting of the construction of a new 40,000 square foot greenhouse for seed research and development on property located (at 1436 Win Hentschel Boulevard, West Lafayette."

These resolutions are able to viewed in their entirety on the Feb. 6 City Council agenda document.

Sanders proposed a few questions to Easter as well as the Inari representative who attended Monday night's meeting, including what qualifies the designated project-development area as an economic revitalization area.

"There was upwards of half a million dollars of remediation required to put a building on that property, I think that qualifies," the Inari representative said. "Everything else in that area has been developed except that piece of property."

Sanders has previously voiced his discontentment with areas being deemed as economic revitalization areas before, such as at the May 2022 City Council meeting where he quoted the Indiana definition of one of these areas as "An area that is within the corporate limits of a city, town, or county that has become undesirable for, or impossible of, normal development and occupancy."

Sanders voiced the sole vote against resolution 04-2023 and 05-2023 regarding the designation areas.

New spay/neuter clinic

An interlocal cooperation agreement - or a contract/agreement between local government agencies - referenced a 4 Precious Paws Low Cost Spay and Neuter Clinic.

"What we approved tonight...is just to take care of spay/neuter services that (The Greater Lafayette provides)," Easter said. "Say we trap dogs or cats, (4 Precious Paws) would be able to provide the service to fix the animal because all of our animals leave the shelter or have an appointment essentially scheduled to be spayed or neutered.

"On a larger component, all of our local governments pay for the services of an animal shelter to take care of animal population. So if somebody finds a stray dog running around West Lafayette (WLPD will pick the dog up) but if nobody claims that dog or cat in 24 hours, they go to the animal shelter."

Easter further stated that 4 Precious Paws will be able to provide the much needed low cost spay and neuter services needed in the Greater Lafayette area, and that this facility will surpass what is currently available to provide those procedures.

Historic Preservation Commission boundaries

An amendment to the West Lafayette Historic Preservation's boundaries, powers, duties, guidelines, fines and procedures document was approved 7-1 with DeBoer casting the sole vote against the changes.

Deputy Director of Development Jenifer Van Schuyver explained in summary what changes have been made to the Historic Preservation Commission's boundaries.

"Just a brief reminder of some of those updates," Van Schuyver said. "...It (clarifies) some definitions including what is a fence, it clarifies what a violation is and also the guidelines for those violations."

The full list of updates for the Historic Preservation Commission are available to the public. Contact the Commission to learn more about the updates at 765) 775-5164.

The Journal & Courier asked DeBoer after the meeting why he objected to updates being made to the Historic Preservation Commission's guidelines.

"I don't believe in historic preservation," DeBoer said. "The United States of America is a very young country. There's very little here that I would consider historic. If you want policy-based reasons, I think that it creates a trap where old technology can end up becoming obsolete and no remedies for it. A house that's insulation is improper and it's drafty, putting solar panels on roofs because technology is developing more to accommodate that, all those things (through Historic Preservation) ends up locking people into a point in time.

"Downtown Paris, the Coliseum, yes alright. Historic by nature. Not (as) much in the United States."

Other news: Mitch Daniels Boulevard backlash, State of the City Address

In response to DeBoer's Joint Board Report, which gave updates on the previously questioned naming of State Street to Mitch Daniels Boulevard. At the December City Council meeting, Peter Bunder, council president, noted that this renaming should be brought up at the next Joint Board meeting. On Monday, both Bunder and Deboer had responses to the investigation into the renaming.

"We had our meeting this month, (the matter that was) brought up on (Bunder's) behalf was the naming of State Street after former President Daniels and the communication that did or did not occur during that period. Long story short, (Purdue) didn't do it for marketing reasons, they were trying to keep it close to their chest."

Bunder aired his frustrations about Purdue's lack of transparency with changes such as this renaming with the city.

"Can you change State Street to Mitch Daniels Boulevard? Sure you can. And if we had to vote it, we probably would have voted yes. But (Purdue) doesn't know that we have to put up with the complaints about why you did it and you did it in that manner."

As stated in the December meeting, that application to change the street name was submitted as the Thanksgiving holiday weekend was coming up, and then it was made official and announced on Dec. 2, not giving much notification or turn around time before the plans were publicly announced.

One of the first orders of business addressed Monday was that of the mayor's State of the City Address where West Lafayette Mayor John Dennis looked back on some of the accomplishments of the city last year and in recent years.

"The SkyWater investment bringing 750 high-paying, high-tech jobs to West Lafayette...and the completion of the West Lafayette public library addition, those are some big wins, but we also have some everyday successes that improve the city of West Lafayette, the service to our city and the environment."

Dennis further discussed the recycling rates of the city, the River Road CSO project and more.

Margaret Christopherson is a reporter for the Journal & Courier. Email her at mchristopherson@jconline.com and follow her on Twitter @MargaretJC2.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: West Lafayette City Council addresses housing shortage, Purdue's impact