FAIRFIELD | Year-round residents of Fairfield Beach want Fairfield University to strengthen its policies against drunken and unruly behavior by students who rent or visit beachfront houses.
Neighborhood residents outlined their request in an open letter to the Rev. Aloysius P. Kelley, the Fairfield U. president. They suggest the university adopt similar policies to those of Loyola University in Baltimore.
Loyola, like Fairfield, is a Jesuit university. The school revised its community standards policies last summer in reaction to complaints about off-campus behavior by students.
The revisions call for Loyola students who host parties where drunken and unruly behavior takes place to be fined $500 and face disciplinary probation after the first offense; fined $750 and deferred suspension after the second offense; and suspension after the third offense.
Offenses that would trigger the fines and sanctions include public drunkenness, violation of under-age drinking laws at a residence, excessive noise and vandalism.
Loyola adopted the new policies after "disquieting" reports that off-campus students living in Gallagher Park had engaged in "repeated acts of vandalism, loud parties at 1, 2 and 3 o'clock in the morning that involved excessive amounts of alcohol, public acts of lewdness [urination, nudity and profanity] and destruction of public and private property," Xavier A. Cole, Loyola's assistant dean of students, said in a letter to Loyola parents in late August.
In the letter to Kelley, members of the Fairfield Beach Road Association said, "You are a private institution and, therefore, you can implement any policies you want to ensure that your students behave appropriately and legally, both on- and off-campus.
"We believe that swift, decisive action on your part is necessary and appropriate. We do not want our neighborhood to continue to be Party Central' for Fairfield University students and their guests, invited or not," they said.
Kevin Hayes, president of the Fairfield University Student Association, said Friday that the part of the letter to Kelley he found most interesting is year-round residents' assertion that Loyola would consider banning students from living at Gallagher Park if behavior there didn't improve.
"They finally put it down on paper -- what their association's true goal is," Hayes said of the Fairfield Beach Road Association's letter to Kelley. "That's to get students off the beach."
Hayes added that Fairfield U. already takes "strict measures against students who commit crimes at the beach.
"Anyone arrested at the beach goes through the judicial process," he said.
Fairfield U. doesn't levy fines on students who violate the university's code of conduct, though university officials have said the percentage of students who go through the judicial system more than once is only 15 percent.
Tensions between year-round residents, beach residents and students -- a running battle for years -- flared again two weeks ago when students living at Lantern Point hosted a luau that attracted 5,000 attendees, according to police. Five students had to be taken from the scene by ambulance because of alcohol poisoning.
First Selectman John Metsopoulos, who received a copy of the year-round residents' letter to Kelley, said Friday, "A number of issues they raised in the letter as solutions to the problem are ones we are discussing, in principle, with the university, and we've made some positive movement in that direction."
Fairfield U. spokesman Douglas Whiting was not available for comment Friday afternoon.
