Anne Linehan over at blogHOUSTON posts on some complaints at UH regarding Chartwells, their managed food provider and links to a Daily Cougar article where students are registering their protests:

I'm not a huge, huge fan of Chartwells, but to be honest I can't rally behind their current set of complaints. Of course, I'm not a clean freak and I couldn't find bottled soft drinks for 99c to save my life.

Mostly, though, I had to endure the company that handled food at UH before when they were on their way out.

From all I'd heard, the company was bad to begin with. It was bad enough that it became pretty obvious that their contract was not going to be extended and they were very unlikely to get a bid (Adam, who was in the RHA at the time, may be able to elaborate on this). Once the company realized that they were serving us on borrowed time, they simply stopped serving us.

For example:

The sandwich place would run out of bread on Thursday and wouldn't replenish their stock until Tuesday.

If someone called in sick, they wouldn't have anyone fill in. Increasing absenteism during exam season meant that a lot of places were closed a lot of the time.

Not only would they not have anyone fill in, they wouldn't make people working at other places help out - even if they were sitting their twiddling thumbs working at the sandwich place without any bread.

They could do all this with impugnity because they knew they weren't getting a contract and residents had to have a meal plan, so they were getting their money anyway.

So when Chartwells came in, they were like a white knight to our rescue. The personnel problems cited in the Daily Cougar didn't exist, the one really good guy from the previous company was held over, and they enlarged the convenience store and had better stock.

The honeymoon didn't last (for me, anyway). The all-you-can-eat cafeteria ceased being all you can eat and the prices of the different plates basically meant that you could have one helping for the same price that you used to have a buffet for. The last straw for me was when they discontinued breakfast.

I wrote a column in the Daily Cougar making this point:

If the purpose of the restaurants is to serve the student population, then we ought to move to a completely capitalistic system where we buy what we want and subsidize the vendors, who pay rent to the University. But if this is to be the case, then we should not be required to buy a meal plan to live on campus. I should not have to shell out more than $400 and then lose that money if it is not spent.

If the purpose is to serve the student residents, then the eating places should at least be open for three meals a day, five days a week, even if there is no profit to be made. The University should also replace any dysfunctional equipment and do whatever needs to be done so Chartwells can do its job (or face the consequences of not doing it without anything else to blame). It's getting to the point that I am waiting for Chartwells to announce it can only serve food between 1 and 1:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday.

I don't know who is to blame. Chartwells rightfully points out that it has inferior equipment and a disinterested student body. Students point out how everything is being taken away from them. However, the administration and Chartwells need to figure out something or give up, rent the space out, and give me my $400 back.

With the student population of UH being relatively small (4,000 or so, I think) and increasingly sprawled, I don't know whether a more capitalistic system would really work.

But the current system isn't working either. Chartwells's predecessor and Chartwells then and Chartwells now all demonstrate this. But if UH wants to become less of a commuter campus, these problems have to be addressed.