University of South Florida students in St. Petersburg say some of their belongings were stolen while their dorms were closed for post-hurricane repairs.
The students were forced to live either off-campus or in on-campus temporary shelter while USF’s Pelican Apartments (referred to by most as “RHO”) was closed for most of October due to water damage from the hurricane. Regardless of their choice, students were not be allowed to enter their rooms in RHO, unless for approved medical needs, to gather any personal items while the building was closed.
The closure started on Oct. 7, and lasted three weeks before a phased reopening started on Oct. 27. Some residents returned as late as Nov. 1.
But some students returned to find personal items, like cash and electronics, missing from where they had been left.
Anthony Rivera, an out-of-state student, who was staying in Atlanta, Georgia for the entirety of the closure, came back to find that his Apple Watch was missing.
“To make matters worse, the school had told us that we had to be out of our dorm buildings by Monday, [Oct. 7] at noon, and I went to leave my room and got locked out. I left my keys on my bedroom desk, and all my roommates had already left. The housing team locked my room and just left,” Rivera told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay.