Reflections on an Ongoing Student Movement

The housing crisis in Humboldt County is nothing new, but a sudden policy change at California Polytechnic University, Humboldt (Cal Poly Humboldt) has incentivized students to rally against the university’s administration in hopes of change.

Controversy began when Cal Poly Humboldt updated its housing policy on Feb. 4 of 2023 with a statement that returning students would not be granted the option to live on campus for the upcoming fall semester. According to this update, university-sponsored housing for students would be relegated to three motels: Comfort Inn Arcata, Super 8, and Motel 6. Resulting from the university’s plans to double enrollment by 2027, this decision put additional pressure on the city of Arcata to address its housing crisis, which already leaves approximately 1.9% of Arcata’s population houseless according to a Humboldt County press release from 2022.

The reaction to this news was rapid and explosive. The threat of being displaced off campus directly implicated the campus community in the county’s pervasive housing crisis. Concerns that motels did not have the space to accommodate all returning students fueled anti-administrative sentiments and panic among university residents. Though campus resources such as the health center, academic support, and the on-campus meal plan would still technically be available to students, another major concern was that living off-campus would limit students’ physical access to these services.

As a result, only four days later, on Feb. 8, a protest was held on the campus’s quad where students voiced their frustrations and demands toward the school’s administration. Lars Hansen, an organizer of the event, wanted the protest to be a space for students to make themselves heard and unite under a common struggle, “I at least tried to use what power I have to give everyone a voice…I tried not speaking at all. It wasn’t really my place after that. It was everyone’s.”

The protest was primarily advertised through fliers with inflammatory titles like “Housing Wars” and “Cal Poly Homeless,” a pre-existing slogan that became the movement’s colloquial name. The phrase “Cal Poly Homeless” stems from houseless students’ previous attempts at dissemination and community building. Hansen noted that the school’s faculty was also involved in the protest’s planning. “They contacted us first, and then we worked with them, but then I basically

By: Pat Gomez-Lopez

wanted to have the protest speak for itself because it wasn’t about inviting them to the table. They wanted to obviously make sure it was all safe. We wanted to make sure that in emergency situations, everything would still be going smoothly, and it did,” Hansen explained.

This involvement is a point of contention for some Cal Poly Humboldt students. “It was a little bit sus that they wanted to organize and protest on campus in the first place,” said Daniel Garcia, a senior at Cal Poly Humboldt and an active member of the campus community. “Why? Because you’re not going to transgress, like you can’t. There’s this quote from Audrey Lorde: ‘the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.’” Garcia, an original member of the Critical Race and Gender Studies club and an experienced participant in student activist groups such as Students for Quality Education, is especially skeptical of the university’s deliberate collaboration with the protest and of the police presence at the event. Garcia believes this involvement to be an indicator of the movement’s assured inefficacy. “I think that Cal Poly Homeless and its initial organizers were extremely nearsighted… and privileged by the university because they were pretty much allowed to do all these things but not face any real threat, and the university’s attempt to co-opt them in the early stages speaks to how transgressive the movement would even be, which is not at all.”

Maria Ortego, a current Cal Poly Humboldt student living off campus, also holds a critical view of the initial Cal Poly Homeless protest. “It seems like that whole thing has died,” she stated, referring to Cal Poly Homeless, “I haven’t heard anything new about it… It’s only on campus that you see or hear about it.” According to Ortego, the insularity of Cal Poly Homeless to the campus community excludes groups of students who are arguably affected the most by the university’s policy change, like students who are facing rising rent prices off campus or who are houseless. “What I think about the protest is kind of just what I think about a lot of protests that happen here… most of it is performative. It gives people the opportunity to vent without actually making any change.”

Though the protest on Feb. 8 marked the extent of student involvement for some Cal Poly Humboldt residents, Cal Poly Homeless did branch off into a student-run organization called the Humboldt Equitable Student Housing Alliance, or HESHA. HESHA’s goals center around ensuring equitable housing for all Cal Poly Humboldt students and coalition-building with Arcata residents. Presence at Associated Students meetings, an organized march to City Hall on Feb. 15, and tabling at Arcata’s weekly farmer’s market are all pragmatic approaches HESHA has engaged in to advance their goals.

Holly Rae, a senior at Cal Poly Hum- boldt and single mom who has been an off-campus renter for three years, stresses the importance of bridging the divide between the campus community and Arcata locals. “The relationship between Arcata and the university is strained. It has been for years…I think it would be really good for better communication to be happening between the community and the students about mutual struggle on this point,” said Rae. She asserted that students will need to build better relationships with the town to get the help they need, especially since the university has not stepped in in any significant way to address this divide.

The housing crisis has been ongoing for decades, and though it has impacted students and local renters alike, both communities have not been able to unite under this shared struggle. One reason for this continued tension is the fear that Cal Poly Humboldt’s substantial enrollment growth will increase rent prices. Worries of getting “pushed out of town” and feelings that “Cal Poly is making [locals] have to leave Arcata, a place they’ve lived for decades,” are common among local residents according to Rae. These anxieties generate animosity toward students.

From the student perspective, many choose not to fully integrate into the local community due to safety concerns, especially in the case of BIPOC and LGBTQ+ students. Many opt instead to live on campus for the duration of their education. “I feel like we could really offer each other a lot of really beautiful things, but right now, with the divisions that we’re seeing, it really is an us versus them situation, which just increases the danger and the risk to the students primarily,” said Rae. For those who cannot afford on-campus living, housing insecurity is not uncommon. Housing insecurity is a state in which one’s living situation is unstable. The term encompasses several dimensions of housing problems ranging from safety concerns and a lack of affordability to houselessness. A study conducted by social work professors Jennifer Maguire of Cal Poly Humboldt and Rashida Crutchfield of California State University, Long Beach, in 2018 revealed that 19% of Cal Poly Humboldt students reported being housing insecure, which is about one in five students. Though Rae is not affiliated with HESHA, she has consulted with and advised its members as an experienced organizer on campus and in the community.

Hansen, after his involvement in the Feb. 8 protest, became a founding member of HESHA. “We’re standing for the same things that the community is standing for,” he maintained. Hansen distinctly separates the conscience of the student body from the capitalistic goals of the university and assures that getting support from the local community would be beneficial for both parties. Hansen explained that local residents “have a little bit more pull and much more experience…in doing things that will change for the better… Getting those local community members will help us speak to the city.” According to Rae, a city ordinance on rent caps, a ban on short-term vacation rentals, and a cap on

Cal Poly Humboldt’s student admissions are examples of changes that would greatly benefit both students and local renters.

HESHA’s next steps are “a little bit ambiguous right now,” said Hansen. Balancing school and activism can be exhausting and has taken a toll on the organization’s progress. “We’re all tired. We come here for degrees more than anything. I think now what we need to do is continue working with the programs that are in school.”

Currently, HESHA’s focus also includes gaining attention from news outlets and reaching out to local organizations that deal with the county’s housing crisis, like food banks and shelters. Hansen has also been planning a letter-writing party, where HESHA members would write letters to people in positions of power, such as state senators, the governor, and lawmakers in Congress. He urges all students to “pour their passion out onto a page” and send a letter themselves.

Since the update on Feb. 4, Cal Poly Humboldt has opened up a limited number of beds to returning students and added the Ramada Inn as a possible university-sponsored housing option. The university has also slated to begin construction on three major infrastructure projects, including Craftsman’s Student Housing, Library Circle Student

Housing, and the Campus Apartments Student Housing and Parking Structure, which would increase housing to accommodate the institution’s growing student population. The university’s official Infrastructure Projects page projects that the Craftsman’s Student Housing will open to students in August of 2025, followed by Library Circle Student Housing in August of 2026, and finally, the Campus Apartments Student Housing and Parking Structure in the Summer of 2027.

In the meantime, Rae stresses the importance of taking the human impact of this crisis seriously, even if it may resolve once housing is built. “I think community response is the immediate answer because the very real issue is we’re going to have students who can’t get housing next semester,” she cautioned. Mutual aid, which can range from students helping each other find available beds, to community members opening up additional dwelling units, could save students from houselessness in the coming semesters. “That would be an incredible show of solidarity between students and the community,” said Rae.

With this recent Cal Poly Humboldt policy, renters and students alike are facing housing insecurity and safety concerns, but an opportunity has also arisen for two divided communities to act in solidarity and begin a process of understanding and mutual support. “It’s in these moments that we are pushed to define what community means, and what community could look like,” offered Rae.