Residential Life can be a force of good at Washington University. Yes, the philosophical inclinations of some students are offended upon learning that ResLife can go into our rooms at any time, including over winter break, but in general, I’ve found ResLife to be helpful. If nothing else, the room key kiosk on the South 40 has more than made up for whatever complaints I’ve had with it over the years.

However, I recently discovered how asinine ResLife’s regulations can be. After no more than half an hour at SHS, I emerged to find my bike, which I had left locked to the railing on the wheelchair ramp, was gone. So too were the bikes of two other people who left at the same time, one of which had been left attached to a light post. After much confusion, we discovered that ResLife had sent someone to cut the locks off our bikes and cart them to a storage facility in Mudd House.

Perhaps the most annoying part of this was that when I finally showed up at ResLife’s offices, the woman on duty insisted that the policy was posted on their website. The relevant part reads, “Bicycles should be registered with University police and secured to bicycle racks outside the residence halls. Do not lock bikes to fences or handrails.” First, this makes no mention of the many bike racks not outside residence halls, which should be equally fair game for shear-wielding ResLife employees, but more importantly, it makes absolutely no reference to what happens if a bicycle is attached to anywhere but a bike rack. In my experience, WUPD would leave orange notifications on offending bicycles giving their owners something like a week to move them. ResLife did put up signs at the beginning of this year, but only on the South 40, and only for a couple days. This is not remotely helpful for anyone who does not live on the South 40; one of the people whose bicycle ResLife removed was a graduate student at the George Warren Brown School of Social Work. And it is certainly important enough that if ResLife is going to make a huge deal out of it, it should at least be online.

What ResLife also fails to mention is that not only will your bicycle be removed—incidentally, with no sign that ResLife took it—but it will be damaged in the process. My bicycle was covered in scratches and the chain was hanging off the gears. Another student has experienced similar but less superficial issues—her seat was damaged. Had my bike been run-down scrap metal, I wouldn’t have been peeved, but it was less than two weeks old and cost $550. Now, it’s banged up, and the chain creaks as it goes around the gears. It protests violently if I try to shift the big gears.

The policy also isn’t equally enforced. When I went to collect my bicycle, the man responsible for cutting the lock met me outside Mudd. Standing a foot away from him were three bicycles, all attached to the bench. I wouldn’t advocate that they be removed, but to take a bike that’s attached to a lamppost and then to stand within reach of three bicycles that are all attached to a bench is hypocritical enough to send anyone into an apoplectic fit.

One would hope the rationale for this would be reasonable. The ResLife employee I asked told me that it is against Clayton’s regulations for bikes not to be attached to racks and that if Clayton police sees bikes not on racks, Wash. U. gets fined $20 a bike. However, when I called Clayton police, the officer I spoke to had never heard of such a policy and told me that it was “probably a scare tactic” on the part of ResLife to make sure students locked up their bikes appropriately. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that the ResLife employee lied to me—I’m sure she was just misinformed—but her misinformation does suggest that there is no legitimate reason for ResLife to be so ridiculous.

I have never been upset with ResLife before this. I never understood the exodus from campus that occurred after freshman year, and I’m immeasurably happy about the housing I was assigned for this year. But this policy leaves a bad taste in my mouth. It is unfair to students, whom ResLife ostensibly exists to serve, has no good reason for existing and needs to be removed.