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The Behrend Beacon
No more kegger parties for nation’s
largest off-campus residence
Student asistants Rachel Wolfe, left, and Jeremy Noller, keep an eye on Knight’s Krossing during a
night’s inspection of the apartment complex across the street from the University of Central Florida.
by Pamela J. Johnson
The Orlando Sentinel
In the nearly two years Jim Sudbay has lived at Knight’s
Krossing, his car has been broken into and its windshield
shot out.
But that’s not why he wants to move out of the nation's
largest off-campus residence across from the University
of Central Florida. The Valencia Community College stu
www.j
esenfes.conn
dent will not renew his lease because he can no longer
have keggers,
“The first year, I really liked it here,” said Sudbay, sit
ting in his apartment beneath a poster that reads, “Do Not
Disturb.” The yellow poster looks like a road sign with a
stick figure on its back sucking down a keg of beer through
a rubber tube.
“Now we’re not allowed to have kegs in our apartments,
or parties at all,” the sophomore said. “Resident assis-
NATIONAL
CAMPUS NEWS
Friday, Febuary 22, 2002
Since August, when UCF took control of the 3,756-bed
Knight’s Krossing and Knight's Court, life has changed
drastically for residents. Knight's Krossing had been con
sidered a crime haven by nearby homeowners since the
first phase opened in August 1997.
Now, only students are allowed to rent rooms. Orange
County deputies have increased patrols. Carrying two-way
radios, UCF-hired student residents patrol the grounds 24
hours a day. No kegs allowed. No parties.
The complex is phasing out students such as Sudbay,
who are unhappy with the changes.
“If I wanted resident assistants, I would have moved
into a dorm,” Sudbay said.
In a $l5B million deal, the owner of the apartments and
College Park Communities transferred control to UCF in
August. UCF and College Park Communities now act as
co-managers. A nonprofit subsidiary of the University of
Central Florida Foundation Inc. issued bonds to finance
the deal.
For years, homeowners had used Knight’s Krossing as
the poster child for off-campus crime. It's one of a dozen
off-campus student residences in Orange County and ad
jacent Seminole County.
It wasn’t just complaints of noise and other nuisance
calls. Since 1997, a few rapes have been reported there
each year. In 1998 alone, four rapes were reported at
Knight's Krossing, according to Orange County sheriff’s
reports. Residents also reported home and auto burglar
ies, robberies and auto thefts at the complex.
During an expansion plan, homeowners packed Orange
County Commission meetings, using the 2,158 calls for
service in 2000 to sheriff’s officials as a clear indication
of the problem. Commissioners axed the expansion plan,
which is being battled in the courts.
The complex, too, has a lion’s share of resident critics
who had dubbed Knight's Krossing as “the definition of
hell on Earth.”
“Stay away!” warned one student, who wrote on an
apartment-rating Web site that she discovered the room
mates assigned to her did drugs but she was locked into a
year's lease. In each apartment, bedroom doors have bolt
locks and bedrooms are leased individually. Often, stu
dents are matched with roommates who are strangers. A
12-month lease is mandatory.
Now, the reputation is changing. Noise complaints - now
stopped by student assistants before deputies are called -
have decreased significantly since the takeover, accord
ing to sheriff’s statistics.
The type of crime appears to be shifting. More and more,
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For example, in January 2001, there were several dozen
nuisance calls, but no robberies. Last month, there were
only a few nuisance calls, but three armed robberies and
one attempted robbery.
Auto burglaries are also rising. Comparing 2000 with
2001, auto burglaries rose 132 percent from 19 to 44, ac
cording to sheriff’s officials. The trend is continuing this
academic year, officials said.
“We still get a few loud parties out there, but they have
dropped drastically since August,” said sheriff’s detec
tive David Padron, who is assigned to the Knight’s
Krossing area. “We get mostly auto burglaries. And ev
erybody we have ever arrested out there for car or home
burglaries has lived elsewhere.”
At the entrance to Knight's Krossing, visitors are now
greeted by a wide black banner that declares in white let
ters, “UCF Affiliated Housing.”
Around midnight recently, the complex was quiet. Only
a few students had called about maintenance problems.
On the chilly night, two student assistants began their cir
cuitous inspection around the buildings.
While they made their rounds, a few pizza delivery
trucks passed slowly around the parking lot. Students
rushed to their apartments, some lugging books.
Then one student assistant ran from a darkened hallway.
“Ahhhh,” yelled UCF sophomore Rachel Wolfe. “I think
someone just sprayed me with a fire hydrant!”
The prankster was nowhere to be found. That was the
biggest incident at the complex that night.
Still, some neighbors are not convinced that things have
improved.
“I don’t believe it’s true,” said Sue Eberle at her
Riverwalk home, a few hundred yards from Knight’s
Krossing. “You don’t put the density of a city in such a
small area. The community cannot handle it.”
Eberle and other neighbors fought bitterly to prevent
the complex from expanding. They have now turned their
focus to another proposed student housing project at
McCullouch and Old Lockwood roads.
Last week, hundreds of homeowners crowded into a
Seminole County Commission meeting to protest. After
listening to testimony for hours, commissioners delayed
their vote until Feb. 26.
That other complexes are now in the hot seat doesn’t
bother Miles Orth, regional vice president ol College Park
Communities.
“We’ve worked really, really hard to improve the im
age at Knight’s Krossing,” Orth said. “1 think we’re mak
ing progress.”
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