By Kevin Horvath
A new housing project is underway that will provide housing for both Riverside City College and UCR students.
RCC Vice Chancellor of Business and Financial Services Aaron Brown said that studies show that apartments at market rate are oftentimes financially out of reach for students unless they have a substantial amount of student aid.
“A new project is underway to build a 1,500 bed facility with 326 units available to RCC students at an affordable rate,” Brown said. “This will provide an opportunity for our students to cohabitate with UCR students.”
Associate Vice Chancellor for RCC Hussain Agah said that a student’s rent should not exceed thirty percent of the student’s AMI (average median income) based on their county. Students will be accepted as long as they meet the low income status.
“The partnership with UCR is great because of the transfer pipeline between both institutions,” Agah said. “It will allow students who transfer to live in the same facility.”
Students must also be full time college students and receive some sort of financial aid. Agah said that the goal is to open the project by the fall of 2025.
Despite the timeline, the contractors involved think that this goal is feasible.
“RCCD was able to secure 75 million dollars for Riverside City College,” Agah said. “We would have not been able to afford this type of project if we had done this by ourselves.”
This collaboration between the college and the university aims to facilitate students to further their education by easing the burden of housing.
“Fifteen or sixteen percent (students) said that if there was housing that they can live in then they would transfer from a part time to full time student,” Agah said.
In order to qualify for this housing the applicant must be a full time student at either RCC or UCR.
“Even though it is a housing project, I would say that our goal is that it’s a student success project that happens to involve housing,” said UCR Vice Chancellor of planning, budget, and administration Gerry Bomotti.
With affordable housing being made available there could potentially be more first generation college students getting their degree.
“The entire idea is to try and get more student success, especially for transfer students,” Bomotti said.
