Northwestern’s chapter of Pi Kappa Alpha is continuing discussions with the University about moving to a new home next fall.
If these talks prove successful, Pike will move to the Goodrich House Residence Hall, according to a press release on the chapter’s website. Goodrich is located on north campus behind Pike’s current house and is made up of 35 single-occupancy rooms.
NU officials sent a statement sent to Pike members stating they had entered into “exclusive discussions” with the fraternity’s housing corporation board and international headquarters to secure the space for the chapter. Pike posted the statement on its website September 20.
Currently, members of Pike’s Gamma Rho chapter have a residence at 2317 Sheridan Road. Pike has been leasing the property directly from Delta Tau Delta, a fraternity that recolonized on campus last year after being shut down in 2007.
Paul Huettner (WCAS ’12), Pike’s director of housing corporation board, said when the University finally decided to relocate Zeta Beta Tau, Theta Chi and Alpha Epsilon Pi last year due to safety concerns, Pike also took the opportunity to begin looking for a new house.
Pike wanted to find a house of their own, one they could lease directly with the University, Huettner said.
“We think Goodrich is one of the top locations on campus,” he said. “It was also one of the only ones available north … It’s currently in pretty good shape and overall we’re very happy with the location. That has been our plan for some time now and finally the university agreed with it.”
Nothing is official and contracts have not yet been signed, Huettner said. Still, he said he was excited about the support from administrators, who were proactive about finding livable housing for chapters on campus. He noted that negotiations are strictly between the University and Pike’s alumni and house corporation board; no undergraduate members are currently involved.
Huettner said Delt’s recolonization on campus — and subsequent plans to move back into their house in Fall 2013 — was merely a coincidence and just one factor the University considered when beginning discussions with Pike.
Pike was originally located at 566 Lincoln Street, which is now a part of the row of condemned fraternity houses that are boarded up and uninhabited. The chapter remained off campus until 2010, Huettner said, when the fraternity reached out to Delt members, whose house they knew to be open.
But Huettner said the arrangement was meant to be temporary.
“It’s always been a thought in the back of our heads,” he said about finding a house exclusively leased to Pike. “We’ve always mentioned it, but nothing has ever been serious until recently.”
Huettner said the undergraduate members were excited about the possibility of upgrading from a 30-person to a 40-person house. He said he hopes the change will encourage alumni to get more involved in the chapter.
“Everyone’s excited about it,” he said. “It can finally be a place, theoretically, we can call our own for a while.”
Correction: A previous version of this story misspelled Huettner’s name. The Daily regrets the error.
