T HE T UFTS D AILY Mouse infestation in sMFa dorm prompts months of complaints, exterminator visits

by Ella Kamm Deputy News Editor

Just before midnight on Feb. 27, several students gathered in a room on the third floor of 1047 Beacon St. to decide whether to kill a live mouse stuck in a glue trap. After months of submitting work orders and calling for assistance that night, it was clear to residents that no one would be coming to help. Together, the residents came to a conclusion: Killing the mouse was the right thing to do. After placing the mouse in a trash bag, one resident offered to step on it.

This was not the building’s first mouse sighting; interviews with students and a resident assistant, as well as documents, emails, videos and photos obtained by the Daily, show that 1047 Beacon St., a first-year dorm for the School of the Museum of Fine Arts that houses up to 34 students, has been infested with rodents since October.

Residents also allege that the university has been slow to respond, offering inadequate extermination services and sending residents with complaints through a sea of red tape, all while the infestation persists.

In a statement to the Daily, Patrick Collins, Tufts’ executive director of media relations, said that the Office of

Residential Life and Learning takes concerns about mice “very seriously.”

“ORLL has been in consistent communication with building ownership, facilities staff, and students,” Collins wrote. “It has been sharing a weekly communication with students with updates and has taken a number of steps, including offering students free food storage containers to limit open food in the building as well as temporary housing options on the Medford campus if they do not feel comfortable on Beacon Street.”

Alyson Costa, one of the first residents to see a mouse, has been alerting the administration to the issue since early October when she submitted a work order to deal with mice in her room. However, she said the process of getting the administration’s attention has been confusing and time consuming.

Costa did not initially receive a response from the university, and no traps were set in her room after the initial work order.

“My work order was supposed to have been flagged [by an RA],” she said. “At that point, there’s absolutely no reason that the school should not have known about this.”

An RA for the Beacon Street dorm, who spoke to the Daily on the condition of anonymity, said that they submitted a work order around the same time and that sticky traps were placed in the RA’s room shortly after. No mice were caught in the traps, but they saw another mouse in their room in early November. see MICE , page 2

At the same time, other residents spotted mice in their bedrooms and common areas.

Cassandra Kellner, another resident of 1047 Beacon St., had her first mouse sighting after Thanksgiving Break.

“I was sitting in my room … and I saw a mouse run across my floor,” Kellner said.

The RA was hopeful that the university would address the problem while the building was largely empty over winter break.

“I’m thinking, ‘We submitted work orders, hopefully they’ll bring an exterminator in over winter break when no one else is here,’” they said.

But by January, the mice problem still endured. The RAs addressed the issue at a building-wide meeting at the beginning of the spring semester, where they instructed residents to avoid leaving food out in their rooms and to be careful about disposing of trash properly.

Throughout February, residents began spotting mice more frequently and finding mouse droppings on desks and clothes.