LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) - Representatives from the University of Kansas’ most well-established fraternities are forming a business league to help protect the groups’ houses.
The Kansas Fraternity Landlords’ League formally incorporated in fall 2015, but its executive director, Aaron Racine, said the league is looking to become more active this semester.
Racine said the nonprofit is similar to trade associations and business leagues.
“We are only successful if we have good houses as tenants,” he said. “They are big, expensive assets. Let’s say a chapter gets disbanded or suspended, or whatever happens to them, what do you do with this big multimillion-dollar property?”
The real estate for the fraternities in the group is worth an estimated $35.7 million, the Lawrence Journal-World (https://bit.ly/2q6I9sw ) reported. Racine said his group ensures the fraternities’ business models support their many assets.
The University of Kansas recognizes fraternities and sororities as student organizations, but their houses are off campus and aren’t owned or operated by the university.
The Kansas Fraternity Landlords’ League currently represents landlords, not students, for 10 fraternity houses that are home to nearly 1,000 students. Racine said sometimes goals intersect between students and landlords, and other times students might not like what the league is pushing.
“We want academically successful, well-behaved tenants in our houses, because if kids want to be there and parents want to pay for them to be there, then our business model flourishes,” he said.
The group plans to lobby against the possibility of the university requiring all freshmen to live in on-campus dorms and delay fraternity pledging until second semester of freshman year, because most freshmen live in the houses and the houses depend heavily on rent income.
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Information from: Lawrence (Kan.) Journal-World, https://www.ljworld.com
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