2008 Woodie Awards
Stolen items cost big bucks
Amanda Dugan/Staff Reporter
Issue date: 4/13/06 Section: News
Flyers are posted around the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union Food Court stating that stolen items such as trays and silverware have cost more than $600.
The signs are posted to encourage students to only use trays if needed and to please not walk away with trays or other items from the union or dining halls.
Dining halls reuse silverware, glasses and trays, and when items come up missing, they need to be exchanged. Every year, Housing and Dining Services have to replace items stolen from the year and use budgeted money, which could be allocated to other areas.
"The money comes from a budget (included in room and board fees) and we have to replace the trays with the money that couldn't be spent on more services or other areas," said Mark Hudson, director of Housing and Dining Services.
Dining services' flexibility allows students to carry out food with Styrofoam containers and/or bags and more often than not, items don't come back.
Housing and dining is using the flyer to make people aware that the items stolen add up and must be replaced.
"A tray here or there is not the end of the world," Hudson said.
But when the trays add up, so does the cost for replacing them. The flyers project a $600 loss only from stolen trays this year, this cost does not include silverware, cups and other items such as salt and pepper shakers, which also come up missing, from the residence halls.
Christina Szmurlo, a freshman special education major, works for the Carman Dining Center and has seen the various methods students have in order to save an extra dollar or two by stealing from the dining center.
"One time, a kid filled up a half gallon of milk," Szmurlo said. "A manager caught him and said he could leave it or drink it, and he drank it all."
Szmurlo said it is not uncommon for students to take fruit with them in their bags or take a piece of silverware every now and then.
"If you can get away with it, you could have a whole 12 piece dinner set in your room by the end of the semester, not that I'm encouraging that," she said.
The signs are posted to encourage students to only use trays if needed and to please not walk away with trays or other items from the union or dining halls.
Dining halls reuse silverware, glasses and trays, and when items come up missing, they need to be exchanged. Every year, Housing and Dining Services have to replace items stolen from the year and use budgeted money, which could be allocated to other areas.
"The money comes from a budget (included in room and board fees) and we have to replace the trays with the money that couldn't be spent on more services or other areas," said Mark Hudson, director of Housing and Dining Services.
Dining services' flexibility allows students to carry out food with Styrofoam containers and/or bags and more often than not, items don't come back.
Housing and dining is using the flyer to make people aware that the items stolen add up and must be replaced.
"A tray here or there is not the end of the world," Hudson said.
But when the trays add up, so does the cost for replacing them. The flyers project a $600 loss only from stolen trays this year, this cost does not include silverware, cups and other items such as salt and pepper shakers, which also come up missing, from the residence halls.
Christina Szmurlo, a freshman special education major, works for the Carman Dining Center and has seen the various methods students have in order to save an extra dollar or two by stealing from the dining center.
"One time, a kid filled up a half gallon of milk," Szmurlo said. "A manager caught him and said he could leave it or drink it, and he drank it all."
Szmurlo said it is not uncommon for students to take fruit with them in their bags or take a piece of silverware every now and then.
"If you can get away with it, you could have a whole 12 piece dinner set in your room by the end of the semester, not that I'm encouraging that," she said.
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