The controversial house search agreement sent to greek houses earlier this month does not allow IU Police Department to barge into houses at will, IUPD and Student Life and Learning representatives said Monday night in a meeting with fraternity and sorority representatives.
The search agreement, which will go into effect when greek houses sign the document, only allows fire and environmental health inspectors to check the house for safety compliance with at least 24 hours prior notice.
IUPD can only enter a house when someone is in danger, as in the case of a 911 call, and beyond that, must operate under normal procedures regarding probable cause and acquiring a warrant.
The agreement has received criticism since its release Aug. 8 for potentially infringing on members’ constitutional right to be free from illegal search. The agreement seemed to indicate an ability of IUPD to freely search houses with 24-hour notice, a claim representatives of SLL and IUPD said Monday was not true.
“We are not changing anything we’ve ever done operationally,” IUPD Lt. Brice Teter said. “This just formalizes anything we do.”
Teter also said IUPD does not have the time to bust up parties on the weekends, as they spend their time answering emergency calls, and that officers are taught the Fourth Amendment, so they understand the scope of what they can search with probable cause.
The housing agreement is supposed to be signed by the end of the month, but director of SLL Stevan Veldkamp said there has been talk of pushing back the deadline and editing the wording and formatting of the document. This could include more clearly separating the IUPD search rights from the search rights of fire and health and safety inspectors, but Veldkamp said he does not know what kinds of edits could be made at this point.
During the meeting, greek representatives questioned Teter about what the search agreement clause allowed. After repeated answers from Veldkamp that the agreement did not change greek houses’ rights when it came to police search and instead codified what is already in practice, several greek representatives questioned why the IUPD search section of the agreement was necessary.
Veldkamp said the point of writing out the already-existent procedures in the agreement was to inform greek residents of their rights.
Also discussed at the meeting was the ban on hard alcohol included in both the housing agreement and a document from April 2015 called the Ideal Vision for the Fraternity and Sorority Community, which outlined goals for solving problems in the greek community.
Although the agreement now allows houses to serve only beer in its original bottle or can and wine poured in plain sight, Veldkamp said this agreement actually gives greek houses more freedom when it comes to alcohol. In the past, he said, greek houses had no written right to have alcohol of any kind in the house.
Some have criticized the liquor ban, though, saying it could potentially push hard liquor consumption off campus or into private rooms of greek houses where sober monitors may not be present.
Greek members also asked Monday what will happen if national headquarters tell their housed members not to sign the agreement. Veldkamp said SLL has previously been in contact with leaders of national greek organizations and will continue talks this week.
Veldkamp said the agreement was revolutionary for allowing more open discussion of the reality of alcohol in greek houses and said it aims to enlighten greek house members about their rights, so that they do not cause further harm in dangerous situations by destroying evidence or not calling authorities for fear of consequences for their house.
“We can’t have anyone die,” Veldkamp said. “We have been so close, and there are so many people in this community. It’s only a matter of time before someone dies.”
