Georgetown students may be discouraged by the University’s concessions in the 2010 Campus Plan battle, but students at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, know all to well what capitulation looks like: students are facing mass eviction from the area surrounding its North Shore campus.

On July 1, the City of Evanston will begin enforcing an old, largely ignored anti-prostitution “brothel” law that prohibits more than three unrelated persons from living together. The initiative will make renting in the area economically unviable for many Northwestern students, forcing them to move far away from their university community to find housing. Northwestern officials, for their part, appear to have resigned themselves to defeat.

“We don’t feel we need to protect the students from a city ordinance—we need to follow the ordinance,” said Assistant Dean of Students Betsi Burns in an interview with the Daily Northwestern. “It is what it is.”

Northwestern originally had no plans to lobby on behalf of its students to amend the ordinance, but following a contentious town hall with students they plan to “discuss” the issue with the city.

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